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I spent a couple of weeks in Japan last summer and spent a lot of time thinking in the context of Japan being a lens through which we can divine insight towards
by kylelibra 16y ago
I spent a couple of weeks in Japan last summer and spent a lot of time thinking in the context of Japan being a lens through which we can divine insight towards where we are headed as a country in the future.
There are two major issues facing the Japanese economy. Nepotism of the old (there is a much more succinct word for this, but it escapes me) and the incredibly long life expectancy of the population. The nepotism of the old (someone please tell me the name for this) is causing issues in a few different ways.
The older government officials are notorious for taking private sector positions in the very industries they previously regulated. This happens so frequently there is actually a Japanese phrase to describe it (again I can't remember for the life of me what this phrase is). In America this happens, but isn't nearly as blatant or widespread. It Japan it is a near guarantee.
The older population in Japan has a stranglehold on influencing public policy. They are a huge block of voters who actually turn out for elections. They consistently vote for, or force politicians to push for, unsustainable short-term solutions to problems. Japan has a pension crisis similar to our social security problem. Everyone knows it is unsustainable, yet the older people vote for it and push the burden onto the young.
The young people entering the economy don't have the job availability they need. Old people aren't retiring as early as they once were and basically aren't getting out of the way for the young. People are living longer and need to work longer. As a result, young workers are forced to be underemployed and struggle to become part of the economy.
There is also the issue of failure being viewed as shameful. There is very little entrepreneurial activity going on in the country so they don't have this potential of creating jobs for the economy.
The long life expectancy is exacerbating all of the above issues. That said, Japan is a fascinating place, the projections towards the strain social security and medicare taking on our economy in the future are good proof that Japan may still offer insight towards our own future.
- jackfoxy 16y agoGerontocracy.
- kylelibra 16y agoThanks, it was killing me that I couldn't come up with the term.
- wgren 16y agoPoliticians taking on jobs in industries they regulated: amakudari, "descent from heaven".
- kylelibra 16y agoExactly the term I was trying to remember!
- xiaoma 16y ago>The young people entering the economy don't have the job availability they need. Old people aren't retiring as early as they once were and basically aren't getting out of the way for the young. People are living longer and need to work longer. As a result, young workers are forced to be underemployed and struggle to become part of the economy. I'm not sure if I'm misunderstanding your argument or not, but it sounds like you're saying that the more old people work, the fewer young people can, i.e. there are a fixed number of jobs. If this were truly the way economics worked, then it would be easiest to find in places full of lazy and/or incapable people. This isn't the case though. As long as there exist services or makable things that people want enough to spend money on, there are always jobs to be done. Maybe the issue is in education, willingness to retrain, liquidity of job markets, or hurdles to starting businesses, but I don't believe that old people working means that young people can't. If 99% of Japanese companies truly did hire old people into upper management who weren't as capable as younger people at doing their work, the other 1% would eat them alive.
- neutronicus 16y agoIf 99% of Japanese companies truly did hire old people into upper management who weren't as capable as younger people at doing their work, the other 1% would eat them alive. "Doing one's work" in the modern world does not happen in a vacuum. If substantial segments of the market refuse to do business with you on the basis of your age, yeah, you're not going to be quite the stellar businessman. When performance is measured by how much money you extract from a few organizations (think government contracting, think enterprise sales, think manufacturing), institutional prejudice can become one of the primary factors determining success.
- xiaoma 16y agoYes, that's a reasonable scenario for heavily regulated industries, some B2B and most government work. It doesn't really address my point about "running out of jobs", though. Older people doing jobs of that sort in no way means that there's a shortage of work younger people could do... unless you're implying that Japanese people are both 1) unwilling to purchase goods and services outside of large industries that discriminate against young people and 2) incapable of creating goods or services non-Japanese would pay for
- r00fus 16y ago> The older government officials are notorious for taking private sector positions in the very industries they previously regulated. This happens so frequently there is actually a Japanese phrase to describe it (again I can't remember for the life of me what this phrase is). In America this happens, but isn't nearly as blatant or widespread. It Japan it is a near guarantee. This totally happens here, and there is a term for it: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Revolving_door_(politics) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Revolving_door_(politics) (Revolving Door) Almost everything you said about older people in Japan can be said about the USA as well.
- eru 16y agoYes, but the demographic outlook of the USA is more favourable.
- deleted 16y ago[deleted]