Well, my dad visited North Korea in the past and I have met people from North Korea (since my home province, Liaoning, share the border with them). North Korea is essentially a has-been economy. It was once prosperous, but collapsed because it is monotonically dependent on a single supply-demand chain (from USSR) and can't rebound back up because of unfavorable geopolitical situations. Now it is a stagnant economy barely getting by. It has a few nice places, but the majority of the country is falling behind the times---------------which, ironically, still makes it better than half of the nations around the world because it at least have peace.
Youd be surprised, buddy, that until 2003, Japan and North Korea had a bilateral trade of $32 billion per annum. Trust me there are forces in Japanese Diet that are calling for restoration of relations between Tokyo and Pyongyang.