And who wouldn't love to live in their "Depression" They have 2% unemployment and some of the highest quality of living standards in the world. Sounds like they are doing something right.
If you opt out of the growth is required mindset its perfectly possible there are other economic models which work just fine to live under despite the scary sounding descriptions.
> And who wouldn't love to live in their "Depression"
The Japanese are committing suicide at higher rates than Americans[1], and a million of them have chosen to live as shut-ins rather than participate in society.[2] They're also not having children. Maybe that's your utopia but it sure isn't mine.
There's an argument that Japanese people don't accept being medicated as much as people in US/EU, which, combined with very supportive parents, means that the depressed people just stay home as shut-ins instead of trying to function on anti-depressants, as they do over here.
Japan's unemployment rate hides a whole host of social and economic problems. Hikikomori have withdrawn from social life to the extent they don't consider work, but the initial cause is often work stress related. The unavailability of child care services means many women cannot consider working even if they want to. Plus, just like the US economy, part-time work is still on the rise, which means people are employed but not financially secure.
Have you been to Japan? People don’t make very much money and work very very hard (or atleast pretend to). They have very small houses and are so risk adverse that most are totally unwilling to even take a small chance to make their lives better. The culture is built on a foundation of shame and fear. Their economy is collapsing and they are too racist to let any immigrants in. Japanese people are probably the most hateful and racist individuals I’ve ever come across. I’ve even come across establishments that ban foreigners from the premises.
I lived there for half a year when my wife was teaching english after college and I wouldn’t want to go back. The dirty looks I got, the salarymen sucking their teeth at me, the houses I was denied from renting, the list goes on and on.
And I look white and put together. God help you if you’re black or an ‘inferior’ darker asian.
> And who wouldn't love to live in their "Depression" They have 2% unemployment and some of the highest quality of living standards in the world. Sounds like they are doing something right.
This guy.
I left Japan because I felt that the fabric of Japanese society was unraveling. Maybe that’s a bit dramatic, but at a minimum, the “social contract” was changing dramatically, and it was debatable whether the change was good or not. My opinion was that it was not.
Note, however, that I was not in Tokyo. Tokyo and the rest of Japan are basically different worlds. I may have a different opinion if I lived and worked there.
Things that made me sad:
- People with good, stable jobs were hyperconservative with their money, as though a crash had just happened or was imminent. This has killed the velocity of money in the country, and it’s terrible for the economy. Simple example, a group I used to be a member of used to have four big enkai (basically a party) at roughly between $100 and $250 a head (sometimes with hotel/onsen stayovers) as well as second, third, and fourth stops at additional bars. For folks with lesser means, the folks with greater means would pick up their share of the extra bars. Now that same group meets once a year at about $50-$60 a head and there is a 1-2 drink second bar. Incomes of the participants is the same or better than before. Note that I am not advocating one over the other, just that it’s indicative of the drastic slowing of the velocity of money in the economy.
- Once-proud towns are becoming villages (legal distinctions) and are having to merge into other towns. This has squashed a lot of the furusato identity, imo.
- Houses in provincial areas, some of them extremely nice, are either abandoned or only used during obon and maybe new year celebrations.
- Top students from top 20 universities are not guaranteed really good jobs any more. Decent ones, sure, but great ones? No. They are feeding much lower down on the food chain now.
- Ways for non-salarymen to have a good social/financial living have decreased dramatically. Far fewer OLs (love or hate the idea of them, they were a great way for men and women of a similar social status to meet/date/get married). For folks with no college, opening a little bar or snack is nothing like it used to be. It’s still possible, but the number of enterprising folks who can open a small bar and reasonably expect to make salaryman level of income or better (it the past, it was often much better) is far smaller than it used to be.
- Degree credentialing has become a thing. I think this was sort of brought over from the US, but the implementation has been terrible. For reference, in my department (I was a professor), the worst students and future professors were the only folks who applied to grad school. The worst students did so because they couldn’t get a job, and a masters degree would help them the next time around. The department took them for the money.
- My close friend and real estate agent and real estate manager actively discouraged me from buying a house. She said it was a bad investment unless you had access to privileged deal flow (like she did) or were going to die on that land (probably not that house).
I could go on. Needless to say, I did not think that my future in non-Tokyo Japan was going to be like living in some sort of utopia. Far from it.
I now live in California. It has its problems, too, but i much prefer it to where I was in Japan. Maybe Tokyo is different, but I wasn’t willing to make that bet over California.
Note that I love Japan, and there are certain aspects I miss about living there, but “great feelings about the current and future social fabric” is not one of them.
I thought about buying one in 2011-12, but there was a good chance I was going to leave the area, so I did not buy.
On a personal level, I’m not so concerned about buying a house in general. If I ever buy one, it will be as an investment at a rock bottom price.
Additionally, where I live, you can rent a place for much less than you can buy it. The only recent time that this was not true was after the crash, and that was only for a brief period of time (4 years tops).
If you opt out of the growth is required mindset its perfectly possible there are other economic models which work just fine to live under despite the scary sounding descriptions.