21 December 2012, the government of Japan is hitting Mitsubishi Electric with hundreds of millions of dollars in fines, after an investigation revealed that the manufacturing giant ripped off taxpayers for at least ten years.

Japan’s Defense Ministry says Mitsubishi Electric overcharged taxpayers on military contracts, to the tune of $295 million USD.

Japan’s JAXA space agency announced that Mitsubishi Electric overcharged the taxpayers by around $74 million.

Mitsubishi must now pay back the overcharges, plus fines, but doesn’t have the money.  But at least the executives of the Japanese company are more responsible than their U.S. unAmerican Corporate America counterparts; Mitsubishi execs will cut their pay in half for at least six months to try and help the company pay the piper (so they say).

Mitsubishi is already in trouble as their sales in China are crashing, and they expect only half of the profits they were forecasting at the beginning of the year.