Oh Japan, Japan, Japan....
Like everywhere, Japan is facing some economic difficulties. In addition to those caused by the current global clusterfuck, there's also the problem of the graying - and shrinking - population. Yup, the birthrate here is low enough that the population is decreasing year by year, and the people who remain are, on average, getting older.
This creates new economic problems - who's going to do the work around here if there are fewer workers? There are really two solutions available: get immigrants to come to the country to fill those jobs that need to be filled, or watch the country diminish into insignificance.
It looks like Japan is choosing the latter.
For example, the country is offering immigrant workers (legal immigrants, mind you) and their families something like 300,000 yen to get out and never come back. These aren't people like me, with cushy English teaching jobs. These are mostly Latin Americans who gained "nikkei" visas due to their Japanese ancestry - many are descendants of Japanese who went to Brazil and other parts of South America. These people mostly work in manufacturing jobs, or do the dangerous, dirty and difficult work (known as "three-k" work, for the Japanese words kiken, kitanai and kitsui) that immigrants do, well, everywhere.“We should stop letting unskilled laborers into Japan. We should make sure that even the three-K jobs are paid well, and that they are filled by Japanese,” [Jiro Kawasaki of the Liberal Democratic Party] said. “I do not think that Japan should ever become a multiethnic society.”
Well, you are certainly within your rights to think that, sir. Just get used to seeing Japan's economic status in the world plummet by 2050 and don't come whining to the rest of us. In the meantime, you're ridding your country of a group of people who both want to work AND who want to live in Japan. Yeah, that's right - get rid of those hard-working, community-contributing-to troublemakers!
And while you're at it, you know those old people you're going to have a shit-ton more of? Well, they'll need nurses. But none of those dirty, dirty FOREIGN nurses.... Like hard-working, professional nurses from Indonesia who spend years studying Japanese alongside their grueling nursing duties in order to pass a certification exam written for native speakers. I'll grant you that if I were a Japanese person in a Japanese hospital, I would definitely want a nurse who spoke my language, that goes without question. But given the choice between having a nurse who has to use her kanji dictionary once in a while and not having a nurse at all, I'd choose the former.
The final fate of Japan's xenophobia will be interesting to watch. Can the public vote in its best interests when it comes time to do so? Can they shout loudly enough that even those crusty old lawmakers in Tokyo can hear them? And will those crusty old lawmakers bow out to more progressive younger ones before they do irreparable harm to their country? Will Japan be willing to give up its precious myth of homogeneity in return for an active, productive economy? Or will it fade away, stoic and proud and ultimately doomed?
Check back with me in 2050 and we'll find out....
This creates new economic problems - who's going to do the work around here if there are fewer workers? There are really two solutions available: get immigrants to come to the country to fill those jobs that need to be filled, or watch the country diminish into insignificance.
It looks like Japan is choosing the latter.
For example, the country is offering immigrant workers (legal immigrants, mind you) and their families something like 300,000 yen to get out and never come back. These aren't people like me, with cushy English teaching jobs. These are mostly Latin Americans who gained "nikkei" visas due to their Japanese ancestry - many are descendants of Japanese who went to Brazil and other parts of South America. These people mostly work in manufacturing jobs, or do the dangerous, dirty and difficult work (known as "three-k" work, for the Japanese words kiken, kitanai and kitsui) that immigrants do, well, everywhere.“We should stop letting unskilled laborers into Japan. We should make sure that even the three-K jobs are paid well, and that they are filled by Japanese,” [Jiro Kawasaki of the Liberal Democratic Party] said. “I do not think that Japan should ever become a multiethnic society.”
Well, you are certainly within your rights to think that, sir. Just get used to seeing Japan's economic status in the world plummet by 2050 and don't come whining to the rest of us. In the meantime, you're ridding your country of a group of people who both want to work AND who want to live in Japan. Yeah, that's right - get rid of those hard-working, community-contributing-to troublemakers!
And while you're at it, you know those old people you're going to have a shit-ton more of? Well, they'll need nurses. But none of those dirty, dirty FOREIGN nurses.... Like hard-working, professional nurses from Indonesia who spend years studying Japanese alongside their grueling nursing duties in order to pass a certification exam written for native speakers. I'll grant you that if I were a Japanese person in a Japanese hospital, I would definitely want a nurse who spoke my language, that goes without question. But given the choice between having a nurse who has to use her kanji dictionary once in a while and not having a nurse at all, I'd choose the former.
The final fate of Japan's xenophobia will be interesting to watch. Can the public vote in its best interests when it comes time to do so? Can they shout loudly enough that even those crusty old lawmakers in Tokyo can hear them? And will those crusty old lawmakers bow out to more progressive younger ones before they do irreparable harm to their country? Will Japan be willing to give up its precious myth of homogeneity in return for an active, productive economy? Or will it fade away, stoic and proud and ultimately doomed?
Check back with me in 2050 and we'll find out....