The great deflation of Japan

In Japan, Young Face Generational Roadblocks

NY Times

January 27, 2011

TOKYO — Kenichi Horie was a promising auto engineer, exactly the sort of youthful talent Japan needs to maintain its edge over hungry Korean and Chinese rivals. As a worker in his early 30s at a major carmaker, Mr. Horie won praise for his design work on advanced biofuel systems. 

But like many young Japanese, he was a so-called irregular worker, kept on a temporary staff contract with little of the job security and half the salary of the “regular” employees, most of them workers in their late 40s or older. After more than a decade of trying to gain regular status, Mr. Horie finally quit — not just the temporary jobs, but Japan altogether.

He moved to Taiwan two years ago to study Chinese.

“Japanese companies are wasting the young generations to protect older workers,” said Mr. Horie, now 36. “In Japan, they closed the doors on me. In Taiwan, they tell me I have a perfect résumé.”

As this fading economic superpower rapidly grays, it desperately needs to increase productivity and unleash the entrepreneurial energies of its shrinking number of younger people. But Japan seems to be doing just the opposite. This has contributed to weak growth and mounting pension obligations, major reasons Standard & Poor’s downgraded Japan’s sovereign debt rating on Thursday.

"Yay! We have no future prospects!" 

“There is a feeling among young generations that no matter how hard we try, we can’t get ahead,” said Shigeyuki Jo, 36, co-author of “The Truth of Generational Inequalities.” “Every avenue seems to be blocked, like we’re butting our heads against a wall.”

An aging population is clogging the nation’s economy with the vested interests of older generations, young people and social experts warn, making an already hierarchical society even more rigid and conservative. The result is that Japan is holding back and marginalizing its youth at a time when it actually needs them to help create the new products, companies and industries that a mature economy requires to grow.

A nation that produced Sony, Toyota and Honda has failed in recent decades to nurture young entrepreneurs, and the game-changing companies that they can create, like Google or Apple — each started by entrepreneurs in their 20s.

Employment figures underscore the second-class status of many younger Japanese. While Japan’s decades of stagnation have increased the number of irregular jobs across all age groups, the young have been hit the hardest.

...

“Japan has the worst generational inequality in the world,” said Manabu Shimasawa, a professor of social policy at Akita University who has written extensively on such inequalities. “Japan has lost its vitality because the older generations don’t step aside, allowing the young generations a chance to take new challenges and grow.”

A couple months ago I volunteered for this cultural comparative business class (taught in English) at Waseda  and at the end, all the volunteers were asked to give a little power point presentation expounding on some key points; this being one of them. In America, about 80% of our economy is made up of small business; the remaining 20% being big corporations. Of course only about 5% of those small businesses make it successfully past the 5 year mark but still, once one business falls three more are being created and many great innovations have come out of Americans taking the risk (Apple, Microsoft, those traveler boxes you can get your Starbucks coffee in). When we brought this up in our presentation, the class room was shocked. Japanese students go to university to get a good job at an already established company whereas American students go to university, get an idea in there head, go for it and then maybe graduate, maybe not; depending on how the business venture goes (of course this doesn't apply to everyone). There are no entrepreneur classes/majors here in Japan, and to me it seems next to impossible to be an entrepreneur here.

He's the Bill Gates of Japan

In another of my own classes I was taking (brain and cognition; a social look at brain science), my professor (who is Japanese) brought this topic up of how Japan is lacking in great innovating minds. He mentioned that (in his opinion) one of the last, most recent people to really make a difference (and become successful in this country) is the CEO of the cell phone company Soft Bank, Masayoshi Son; and he's not even Japanese, he's a third genner Korean living in Japan! 

I have friends who are working as these "irregular workers", and other friends who are going through the awful job hunting process here that takes place in your junior year of university. All of them tell me how bleak their prospects are looking and that they don't know what to do. 

So why is Japan like this? Is it all the old people's fault? Should we have a Battle Royal with the old people (and the winner gets to live out the rest of his 10 years) to make way for the younger generations? Or is it a laziness on the part of the younger Japanese people? Is it fair to compare them to Americans considering how well (sarcasm~) we're doing at the moment. What do you think? Leave your comments!

PEACE OUTSIDE

Jamie 

It was then that she said goodbye to studying and hello to the paychecks

My last final was Saturday (wtf, right?) as well as my last Japanese class (even though the final for that class was on Monday, the JPN department seemed to think that that wasn't good enough). Friday I went and signed my contract with Gaba, so it's official! I start the certification training next week (three full, 10-7 days of unpaid training; just how I wanted to start my vacation) and then I can start bringing in the money!

But Jamie, you're going to Southeast Asia for three weeks soon aren't you? Won't that be a conflict of interests?

un-paid holiday, but who cares!

 

 

Fear not, my loving audience because my contract is what they call an omyou itaku (which means something like entrusted contractor or something?) so they have no say over how much I work or when I work (although they prefer I work more than less) and although it will be a bit warui (bad) that I'll leave so soon into starting (because my paycheck is based off of how many students I actually teach; no students, no money), there's nothing I can do about it. I'll explain to the manager at my Learning Studio and I'll probably get some words of disapproval but, shouganai! (nothing can be done to avoid it). My boss at my other job (Lily English Salon) is completely chill with it so at least that's covered.

we interrupt this program...

A girl I met a couple months ago at a mutual friend's birthday party is one hell of a vocalist. However, it  just so happens that she lacks a guitarist to back her.

Her: "Jamie, do you know anyone that has an acoustic guitar and is willing to play the music I choose? "

Me: ":D,
Why it just so happens"

Her: "Would you want to perform with me this coming Thursday?"

Me: "Would I!"

So I'm accompanying her on guitar this Thursday at a place called The Pink Cow (more details to come) in Shibuya and I am totally stoked!

Except I just realized that my last training day falls on Thursday so I'm going to have to beat feet to get there and perform in my suit. But whateva; I look good in a suit ;D

-------------------In unrelated news------------------------

Everyone should read this article about the "Tiger Mom" and seriously think about what it talks about because next post will be on it and I want to hear your opinions as well!

http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,2043313,00.html

PEACE OUTSIDE

A perfect slice of Spain in Tokyo, Take Dos

For some reason I always think it's
a better idea just to hit the color
ball with the stick, no need for the
middle man in my game, sorry
mister white ball.

Let me tell you, the Japanese have the art of taking their hobbies and perfecting them to a tee. Whether it be bowling, pool, guitar, cooking, dancing, or any sort of activity you can think of, these people dedicate themselves to it. For instance; I went out to play pool with some of my buddies the other night after my second interview with Gaba. Now, I failed geometry and therefore fail at pool so anyone who can successfully get a ball into a hole is a pro in my eyes. That said, I don't really know what goes into, or how to become a professional pool player. But let me back this up a little bit; the environment.

I swear i'm going to loose a lung to
Japan's bad habits.

The place we played at was on the second floor of this shabby building, and the room was even shabbier. The walls, which I'm assuming where once white were now stained yellow because smoking is allowed, which is one thing that is very hard to get over for someone who doesn't smoke. From coffee shops to game centers, almost everywhere allows smoking in Japan (except for recently, a lot of areas have banned smoking on the street...?) so when I go out with friends, it feels like I end up smoking their pack of cigarettes with them. But it's just one of those things that you have to put up with or suffer having no social life. Anyways, I digress. Yellow walls, grimy carpet, cardboard over some of the windows and the other windows look out to the grey grimy wall of the next building. In America, one would expect to find a bunch of hard-core, hairy bikers (you know the sort) guzzling booze and starting fights. Here in Japan however, despite it's appearance, it is a totally family friendly environment! They had a vending machine that sold coke products, not beer, they played nice music, and it was fairly cheap ($4.00 for two hours or something). The place was pretty full that night as well, and almost all of the other players freakin' had their game on. I had to try and ignore everyone around me as I played so that I didn't get intimidated.  

picture this guy, except with Ichiro's face. 

I've noticed this a lot with other activities; there are so many amazing guitar players here for instance, as well as a crap ton of dancers that practice in front of the station late at night who all move like pros to me. I wonder if it's because of the whole "work hard, play hard" mentality they have here, or if it's partly due to being raised in an environment where people are expected to give their all when it comes to anything they do (which isn't a bad thing at all! I wish more people were like this, but they don't call it a "hobby" for nothing). I don't know, and I know this doesn't apply to everyone because I know there are a lot of lazy/ordinary shmucks out there too but it just seems that almost everyone I see/meet/watch on TV (they have a lot of talent TV shows here) is completely dedicated to one thing and are extremely good at that one thing. At Waseda alone, there are hundreds of clubs that practice/meet everyday it seems, and these clubs are usually more important than school itself. For instance, the gym at my school is in the basement of this one building that I think is dedicated to music/dance practice studios and it's always packed, which is a little annoying when it comes to the music practices because it's a bunch of different instruments playing different things all at once, creating this awful cacophony of noise that you can hear all the way down to the basement. One problem I have though, when it comes to the preforming arts here in Japan is this; most people seem so concerned about technique and playing/preforming things per-fectly that they lack in passion. For instance;

"some people just collect baseball cards"

After playing pool, me and my buddies were a bit hungry so we wandered around Baba (city name) in search of something cheap and delicious. We eventually found ourselves at this Spanish restaurant named Familia (located near the train station for those who are interested). The food was definitely delicious; the price though, hurt a little bit.This place occasionally has Flamenco shows and it just so happens that this night was Flamenco night (which is why the price was so high because they had a table charge of $15 freakin' dollars!!). There were only my group and a threesome of old people there (hence the table charge) but it was exciting none-the-less. There was a guitar player, a singer, two dancers, and not a Spanish person in sight. They were all Japanese but for some reason (the singer said it was because of the rhythm) they all decided to learn the art of Flamenco. Not being able to speak Spanish, I have no idea if the singer's Spanish was any good/made any sense but, he fooled me either way.

pfft, I wish this is what we ate! Thanks
to limited understanding on the
Japanese end however, we
ended up eating pasta. lol

Now the dancers (here's were I go into the lacking passion for the sake of preforming to a tee), one lady I thought had to be at least halfies Spanish or Latina or something, for she was incredible! Full of life, and passion (there's that word again) and just watching her I could tell that this was what she lived for. You could see it plainly in her face when she was dancing, that nothing else could make her happier than that moment. Her movements were one with the music (I know, cliche, but no less true!) and it was all in the hips baby. Just a phenomenal performance. Turns out she's full Japanese and has only been to Spain once for vacation.

Like, seriously. The guitar player kinda looked like this too. 

The second lady on the other hand, not so much. She had rhythm and knew that steps but she lacked, you guessed it, passion. Her expression was stony (perhaps concentrating too much?) and her movements where stiff. Perhaps she hasn't been doing it as long as the other lady, perhaps this was her first performance, I don't know. I just know that the other lady was a lot more pleasing to watch. I got this same sort of feeling when I was at that salsa club forever ago. All the people from Central America regions, etc obviously had dancing in their blood, whereas the Japanese people simply just had the steps memorized.


Perhaps you might be thinking "well Jamie, everyone knows that no one can rival the Spanish/Latinos/etc in the art of dance!", or maybe "well, it's (this style of dancing) just not part of the Japanese culture so obviously it doesn't come naturally to them" and you're right, so let me give you another example. Bands.

You can play his solos, but
can you rock like him? 

I was talking with another friend of mine about this the other night and he was telling me that a mutual friend of ours band was so stressed out about performing perfectly that they lacked character/charisma on stage, which is one of the most important things to have when in front of people (crowds can are like children and can sense weakness...or is that dogs?). I guess they had one show where they loosened up a bit and had a little more fun, but afterwards kept on repeating how much they sucked that night because of all the mistakes they made. I've noticed this behavior with some of my other friends who have done/are in bands and they wonder why their not attracting more fans. The time to play perfectly is when you're recording; all other times just have fun because if you're having fun, then the crowd is having fun no matter what you sound like (well okay that's not entirely true, speaking from experience that I don't really wanna go into but that some of you might recall).

Do you think they give so much about what they sound like
on stage? No, but look at how many more fans they have
than you! XD 

Phew, that was a long rant. I guess what I'm really trying to say here is that people everywhere (not just Japanese, i'm only picking on them because i'm here), need to learn how to loosen up a bit. Life isn't about perfection. Have fun, and enjoy the moment.

-Jamie

"Because winning isn't everything. It's
the only thing." 

Eikaiwa (English English English)

Today's interview at Minerva English School for Kids went far better than my interview yesterday with Gaba.

Yesterday it was all business and no play. Suit, tie, shiny shoes and a "go-get-em slugger" attitude. Which is fine for those who wish to work in a big corporation and move their way up the food chain. But that environment doesn't suit me well.

Minerva, although also a big corporation thus having some of the same mentalities, seemed much more laid back. The person that gave the seminar about the company didn't stand in front of us and talk through his power point like the Canadian guy at Gaba (who actually said a-boot instead of about which made the situation even more stressful because I was trying not to laugh the whole time). Instead this nice gentleman from Kansas sat down with us and started off with a short introduction of his life story and how he ended up where he is now. Long story short, it pretty much went like "I found myself here, but then decided I didn't like it so I went here; found myself a lady, had a kid then moved to Japan to help out wife's family thus found myself teaching English to children". A very laid back fellow who seems to just go with the flow but at the same time a hard working individual. Then a little about the company (blah blah, want people who are dedicated, blah blah, loves children, blah) then the individual interviews. Overall I think I left a good impression. The only snag is they contract out for a year instead of 6 months like Gaba in which case I am either going to have to lie and then quit in July, or see about them changing my visa status and staying on until the end of December when my landing permit expires. But, we'll cross that road when we get to it.

Or it could be a complete disaster, but we'll find out!

I think working with children will be exciting and great experience so, once again, FINGERS CROSSED!












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And recently in American News; our children are getting cheated out of their education once again.

"You can't use that word!! That is OUR word!!"

What the heck is this business with Huck Fin? I mean, don't they know that the more they ban a book the more people are just going to read it? And revising it to exclude the 'N' word is just ridiculous!! I mean, yeah it's offensive and no one but black people have the right to use it, but it's an important part of our past that people need to be aware of. This book demonstrates how people behaved back then, so why cover it up and make it PC? Why skew history? I mean, it is adult material (even though it's considered a children's book) and I don't think kids should be reading it in elementary or even middle school because they don't yet know how to appreciate what they are learning about (their brains aren't fully equipped with the ability to understand things like "don't use this word because it's bad"  so you'd have kids screaming the 'N' word everywhere just because teacher said it was bad XD).

And what are they going to do about the character Jim? I mean, he's depicted as this dim-witted black dude and paints black people to be stupider than the rest of the world. Are they going to write him out of the book as well? Or better yet, make him white?! I read it in high school (wasn't banned in my district) and think that in every high school English Lit class it should be read as it was meant to be read.

Why are Americans turning into such ill-witted, PC pussies? What happened to the good ol' days of plummeting kids with red bouncy balls and swing sets? I mean, aren't us Americans supposed to be badasses with our guns and straight forwardness?  I say we get off our wussy wagon and get in touch with our vulgar sides! Viva La Revolucion!

You tell them pussy's Johnny! 

 PEACE OUTSIDE!
-J