Japans Demographic Crisis Worses

[Infinity Wave 7,635]

6 hours ago, Economy said:

Their xenophobic attitude preventing larger immigration doesnt help

 

If theres a country that desperately needs more immigration, its them

They've been saying this also in Italy.

Now, I do think that immigration could eventually save the situation, but not ANY kind of immigration.

What we need are younger generations who study, work and pay taxes and all services the State provides them.

Accepting any kind of immigration won't help building this nee generations, because, at least in Italy, African immigrants come alone, without their families; they work illegally in terrible conditions and are underpaid - and that's because of they're emplyers, who exploit they're willingness to make some money to live. In this conditions, they'll never be able to have a family (if they don't have a family in their country of origin - which is the most common scenario).

I'm not saying we shouldn't accept them, that's not the point of this post nor discussion.

What I'm saying is, the whole "immigrants will pay for our retirement system" rethoric is absolutely fake with the kind of immigration we currently have in Italy.

Immigrants should come from a similar economic background, because if they come from developing/underdeveloped countries, searching for better conditions, they'll accept any work at any condition. 

So I think immigration can be the solution, but not at all any kind of immigration.

6 hours ago, Economy said:

If they didnt retire at 60 and the female labor force participation rate wasnt so low then perhaps males 20-60 wouldnt have to work such rediculous hours

Its also ludicrous that the Country in the world with the oldest aged population and fastest shrinking labor force has their population retiring at 60

For goodness sake people aged 100 or more is their fastest growing demographic group, 20%  of their population is already over 70 and by 2030 over 2/3 will be over the age of 50

How does their government not get that a retirement age at 60 isnt sustainable for them?

They already have the highest debt burden in the world (230% of GDP, about double the US debt ratio) and run insane deficits because their retirement system and medical costs are surging while their working population paying taxes is shrinking

@Morphine Prince @Woolfsmck @Luc how does a country in Japans situation even fix itself?

I feel like they are doomed to inevitable collapse one day

They have been printing lots of money since 2000 (they invented QE money printing.which the world tried in 2008), almost 30 years of stagnant economic growth, no inflation... This is not normal

The only reason they havent collapsed yet is because deflation and shrinking businesses make stocks a poor investment and shrinking population makes real estate a poor investment as well so their old conservative investors just invest in government bonds

As a result despite a rediculous debt load so far Japan manages to borrow plenty and at very low interest rates

From what I know, Japan debt is (100% or so) held by Japan itself. Japan doesn't have debts with other countries and that's why they can count on all of the things you listed.

[Economy 53,160]

1 hour ago, DeIusional said:

How, and why do people work such long hours? Is there any need for that extra money than the usual amount of hours? No way is there that much work to need/want to work 118 hours a week.

Some of it is just the culture

 

It also doesnt help that female labor force participation is low. By making the men the sole prividers in many families they are forced to work crazy hours

[Economy 53,160]

2 hours ago, Luc said:

They should start admitting migrants. There's millions of Chinese, Indians, Philippinos, Russians and Indonesians who would love to work in Japan and pay for their social services, but they prefer to keep their country homogenous. That's their choice, sure, but this is the result. It's the only thing I can think of that would be a 'quick' solution. In the meantime they can work on destroying the sexist working culture and current working culture in general that disincentivizes female employment and disincentivizes productivity. I talked to a Japanese girl who worked 118(!!!!!!) hours a week, excluding travel time.

 

In the long term, I think that all countries will experience this problem. China most of all. Good for the climate - I think we should 'aim' for a global population of a billion in the long term - but bad for economics. We don't know how to deal with a zero-growth economy. On the other hand, I think European countries could handle the situation Japan is in right now way better, because the public debt burden in Europe is much lower and people here are really allergic to government deficits. 

Japans debt is this high in part BECAUSE of its demographics tho

 

Healthcare and pension costs surge while tax base if working people shrinks

 

And ur right about growth. The entire economy is based on growing businesses, investing to grow etc

 

Falling demand, shrinking local businesses is not how the economy was built to function so it suffers

 

Their construction industry must be quite small excluding old building repairs... demand for credit must also be very low which would explain why the government can have such huge debt and get away with it and have such low rates

 

If mortgage and business lending drops, fixed income investors, pension funds and banks either have to invest abroad and take currency risk, or they invest in the one Japanese credit market that grows which is government debt

 

Certainly explains how a country with a debt of 230% of GDP manages to still borrow below 1% interest cost with ease

[Economy 53,160]

12 minutes ago, Infinity Wave said:

They've been saying this also in Italy.

Now, I do think that immigration could eventually save the situation, but not ANY kind of immigration.

What we need are younger generations who study, work and pay taxes and all services the State provides them.

Accepting any kind of immigration won't help building this nee generations, because, at least in Italy, African immigrants come alone, without their families; they work illegally in terrible conditions and are underpaid - and that's because of they're emplyers, who exploit they're willingness to make some money to live. In this conditions, they'll never be able to have a family (if they don't have a family in their country of origin - which is the most common scenario).

I'm not saying we shouldn't accept them, that's not the point of this post nor discussion.

What I'm saying is, the whole "immigrants will pay for our retirement system" rethoric is absolutely fake with the kind of immigration we currently have in Italy.

Immigrants should come from a similar economic background, because if they come from developing/underdeveloped countries, searching for better conditions, they'll accept any work at any condition. 

So I think immigration can be the solution, but not at all any kind of immigration.

From what I know, Japan debt is (100% or so) held by Japan itself. Japan doesn't have debts with other countries and that's why they can count on all of the things you listed.

Its way higher than 100% unless thats net debt (subtracting assets or debt owed to them)

 

And yes most debt is held domestically by its own citizens and institutions and that helps because debt payments go back into their own economy. Doesnt mean the financial pressure isnt there regardless tho

 

Most countries debt is domestically owned actually by private investors, pension funds, corporations etc despite the common belief that countries governments are lending eachother

 

However in Japans case the percentage of debt thats held domestically is even higher than in most countries

[LeJudas 6,490]

8 hours ago, Economy said:

Whats hentai?

It's not pr0n it's art 

[Luc 4,776]

2 hours ago, DeIusional said:

How, and why do people work such long hours? Is there any need for that extra money than the usual amount of hours? No way is there that much work to need/want to work 118 hours a week.

It's Japanese working culture. You leave only when the boss has left, otherwise you're a bad employee. The boss stays until night. Then you arrive early in the morning next day.

Are those hours productively spent? Of course not. The only thing that matters is your physical presence. The girl who told me she worked that much said she was just randomly hitting keys on her keyboard (asdfiojfjfjifijfjifjifjifjiwefafjwjeij) most of the day.

You find this toxic working culture in South Korea as well, where many bosses expect you to drink alcohol with them and co-workers till night after work. 

[Brie Candy 18,676]

Yesterday i watched Christiane Amanpour: Sex and Love Around the World and there is an episode about Japan. You should see it. 

[S0436 10,215]

Trump and Brexit effect

[Helxig 45,782]

I don't think they're gonna struggle to stay around tbh    there's still 126 million Japanese people

[Kattys 4,319]

4 hours ago, DeIusional said:

How, and why do people work such long hours? Is there any need for that extra money than the usual amount of hours? No way is there that much work to need/want to work 118 hours a week.

Culture. You would be considered as lazy if you left work after just 8 hours. I remember being in Japan and in Tokyo so many people were travelling back from work around 9pm

[MelbHawker 6,583]

Japan is literally so overpopulated  I was there last year in 'off-peak' season.. I couldn't move. I don't think they're in a crisis. 

[FRANK1991 3,329]

My friend works in Japan

She's overworked and underpaid 

She's depressed, she said people jump the train every week, when that happens the trains have to be stopped, people can grab a slip that said they are late for work because of "accident" in the station.

She said it's so common they are all used to it and tbh she can understand why people jump.

 

The whole time she was telling me this I was like  the **** is wrong with this country they are so messed up! they pretend to live in the most modern country in the world but I see through you

So many hidden rules in this country too! She said she can't keep changing jobs coz it's not gonna look good on her resume. I asked her why. She said companies will see it as you are not loyal and leave soon.  Um well if your company overwork your workers with no pay duh they gonna leave for sure!

 

When I went to Japan to vacation, all office workers wear black suits and white button up shirts. It's a sea of black and white and they can't wear anything else except that crap. No wonder they jump all the damn time if they had to wear that death suit every day. 

I wouldn't want to work in this kind of environment or have a child grow up in this toxic system at all so makes sense.

[Miel 15,009]

11 hours ago, Helxig said:

I don't think they're gonna struggle to stay around tbh    there's still 126 million Japanese people

 

9 hours ago, MelbHawker said:

Japan is literally so overpopulated  I was there last year in 'off-peak' season.. I couldn't move. I don't think they're in a crisis. 

Yeah. I wouldn't say "overpopulated", but from my experience growing up there, I would (at first glance) definitely say it is very decently populated.

That said, I'm guessing the issue isn't solely on overall population as much as it is the age distribution of population. Large-scale systemic factors of cultural attitude regarding work and gender roles, the effect of military presence, and many many other factors contribute.

[Economy 53,160]

10 hours ago, MelbHawker said:

Japan is literally so overpopulated  I was there last year in 'off-peak' season.. I couldn't move. I don't think they're in a crisis. 

The crisis isnt the total population itself. Thats a whole seperate issue

 

Its the fact that its aging so much and population declining so rapidly regardless of the total its falling from

 

A country can be super overpopulated... a fast shrinking population will still have serious economic effects regardless. The fact that its over populated changes nothing

[Marilyn MonHoe 11,011]

22 hours ago, ObezyankaNol said:

I prefer Yaoi

I think we ALL prefer yaoi