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Some context on the japanese job market from what I've seen: - The entire japanese job market's wages are depressed[0] - In 2019, pressure had to come from th

Some context on the japanese job market from what I've seen: - The entire japanese job market's wages are depressed[0] - In 2019, pressure had to come from the PM (not the local unions) to raise the minimum wage to 1000 yen/hour (~$9/hour)[1] - Engineers are underpaid here, possibly more so than the EU in relation to the US. This is amplified for japanese companies (whether "black"[1] or not) - With nationalized healthcare and generally low cost of living (even in Tokyo, a "world city"), most workers do not feel the pain of being underpaid sharply. Cultural differences and a propensity to save (more ant than grasshopper, let's say) generally feels like the backstop behind the economy (other than the BOJ's enormous purse and very active involvement). - There is a sort of inbuilt trust in the society that expresses itself in economic transactions (loan companies can be very trusting, risk is considered low with Japanese applicants, etc) and greases the wheels of commerce most of the time, if all participants are local. There are other factors (sometimes the same ones) that make it difficult/slow down japan but those are well discussed generally. - "Super Salaryman" is a colloquial term here (I can't find it on wiki or elsewhere) for a salaryman[3] that makes 10 million yen (~$90k) per year - Japanese companies often provide "free" company housing to new grads to enable them to save while being paid relatively little. Many live with for a bit after graduating (women more so than men) as well without much stigma. - Company standing/appearances mean alot -- $60k at [large conglomerate] is far and away more prestigious than $80k at [unknown startup] in the eyes of many. [EDIT] Added some more from a different comment that might be useful. [EDIT2] - fix the super salaryman yen estimation, confused with 10 million [0]: https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2021/03/17/business/lowest-pay-rises/ https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2021/03/17/business/lowest... [1]: https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2019/06/07/national/japan-facing-increased-pressure-hike-minimum-wage-business-leaders-give-mixed-response/ https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2019/06/07/national/japan-... [2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_company_(Japanese_term) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_company_(Japanese_term) [3]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salaryman https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salaryman

wait_a_minute 5y ago
This is very interesting. So a person can raise a larger family on an engineer’s salary and be happy in Japan? An American expat.
- hardwaresofton 5y ago
  At many Japanese colleges, graduating with ~$40k/year at an office job is considered success after undergoing "seishoku katsudou" which the junior year college hunting process, as long as the company is of good repute. As japan is very homogenous culture wise relative to other countries, it's very common for people to generally start families before ~25/by the end of their 30s. $40k is a salary under which doing this is tight, but not impossible. Japanese companies also give pay bumps eventually of course, and are very loathe to fire (worker rights are strong in japan), with an engineer's salary of "only" 100k (which honestly was being paid to interns at FAANG 10 years ago) you could raise multiple families here. There is something called a "super salaryman" which is for salarymen who make ~$100k (1 million yen IIRC). Achieving this status is recognizable and makes a lot of things (getting loans, etc) easier -- that should say something about the mindset. It's still unclear if engineers in American are ridiculously overpaid, or if engineers in Japan and the EU are ridiculously underpaid. I lean towards the latter. [EDIT] - forgot something, it used to be common practice in Japan to pay people according to life circumstances (getting married, children, etc) or other things (lots of info here[0] though it doesn't directly cover this was something I learned studying in Japan in some undergrad Japanese management course). It would be naive to think people aren't paid slightly differently because of their life situation here though -- it's very easy to rationalize paying someone more because they have more "responsibility" at home/in society, and maybe arguably even morally correct. [0]: https://www.ilo.org/ifpdial/information-resources/national-labour-law-profiles/WCMS_158904/lang--en/index.htm https://www.ilo.org/ifpdial/information-resources/national-l...
  - nsonha 5y ago
    > if engineers in America are ridiculously overpaid, or why do you only compare to Japan and EU? American engineers get paid more than anyone else (except for EU outliers). I make slightly above 100k in Australia, it's a bit tight with the housing situation and cost of living but it's liveable. Cost of living in the US is lower except for maybe healthcare but engineers get companies pay for them anyway. I don't have insights into other engineering, but I think software engineers are overpaid. Would I enjoy being overpaid? Of course, but it's hard to say it's fair pay considering what people in other professions are making.
darren_ 5y ago
Nitpick but you've repeated it in another comment so maybe worth correcting - 1 million yen is about $9k. 'Super salaryman' would probably be 10 million yen, I'd guess (haven't heard the term, but that doesn't mean much).
- hardwaresofton 5y ago
  Thanks for pointing this out -- yup, 10 million yen is what I meant there, I corrected it in the original comment
pezezin 5y ago
You are off by an order of magnitude, 1 million yen is ~9k USD. That's a ridiculously low salary here, fine for a college kid with a part time job ("arubaito") at your local konbini, but not much else. Maybe you got confused because China, Japan and Korea group numbers by powers of 10 000 ("man")? Now a 1000-man (10 million yen, around 90k USD or 75k EUR) salary would be amazing, the average Japanese salary is 3 million yen.
- hardwaresofton 5y ago
  Thanks for pointing this out -- > That's a ridiculously low salary here, fine for a college kid with a part time job ("arubaito") at your local konbini, but not much else. True -- min wage is 1000 yen, not hard to work out the lowest theoretical yearly salary would be with a 5 day work week. The usual exception of waiters that are below the min wage isn't here since the service sector generally doesn't do tipping. > Maybe you got confused because China, Japan and Korea group numbers by powers of 10 000 ("man")? Yup this is exactly it. Can't get used to dealing with that extra order of magnitude.
  - pezezin 5y ago
    You're welcome. The worst part is trying to read out loud a number. It's fine when you see a number like 1億6432万4871 and you know exactly where the splits are, but most of the time they will just use commas as thousand separators and write numbers as 164,324,871, and then it becomes really difficult to parse numbers, even for them.
    - hardwaresofton 5y ago
      > The worst part is trying to read out loud a number. It's fine when you see a number like 1億6432万4871 and you know exactly where the splits are, but most of the time they will just use commas as thousand separators and write numbers as 164,324,871, and then it becomes really difficult to parse numbers, even for them. Yep, or trying to figure this out in front of someone you're making a deal with -- normally I'm all alone writing an estimate/invoice when I'm figuring out. Sales in japan is one part of the japanese business experience that I do not do, and avoid every time I can. Most of the time I just do everything in dollars -- Americans have a reputation for thinking of everything in American terms, so why disappoint? On a serious note though, a lot of local counterparties are fine doing things in dollars here as well.
imtringued 5y ago
>BOJ's enormous purse and very active involvement The BOJ is very inactive. Yes, the numbers are big but that money hasn't entered the economy.
- hardwaresofton 5y ago
  Claiming that the BOJ is inactive is either an indicator that you're an insider and I have no idea what I'm talking about (as an outsider am bamboozled by the magic trick/strong jawbones of the BOJ), or that you have no idea what you're talking about (with no disrespect). I don't mean to sound combative but this is such an extreme statement (in my view) that I'm eager to find which scenario is true. The BOJ is so active that we talk about the progression of the US in terms of "japanification" -- as in the US is going somewhere (in monetary policy) japan has already been. ZIRP, extended forever-QE, messing with whatever rates they needed to, buying JGBs, buying stocks. BOJ is not an inactive central banking institution. This doesn't even take into account the borderline conspiracy theories floating around on the way the BOJ exerts control(summed up by Princes of the Yen[0]). Could you explain a little more about why you think the BOJ's actions in the last like... 3 decades have somehow not "entered" the economy (which I don't think is synonymous with not affecting the economy)? [0]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p5Ac7ap_MAY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p5Ac7ap_MAY
unscaled 5y ago
Is Super Salaryman really a thing? I've only ever heard of this TV series[1], about a regular salaryman who becomes a superhero. Crossing the 1000 man (10 million) yen barrier is a thing though, I just don't know if it has a special name. [1] https://asianwiki.com/Super_Salaryman_Mr._Saenai https://asianwiki.com/Super_Salaryman_Mr._Saenai
- hardwaresofton 5y ago
  Yeah I really struggled to find anything about it, but it's a term I've used with people here... reaching out to ask some friends if maybe I got the term wrong.

wait_a_minute 5y ago

This is very interesting. So a person can raise a larger family on an engineer’s salary and be happy in Japan? An American expat.

hardwaresofton 5y ago
At many Japanese colleges, graduating with ~$40k/year at an office job is considered success after undergoing "seishoku katsudou" which the junior year college hunting process, as long as the company is of good repute. As japan is very homogenous culture wise relative to other countries, it's very common for people to generally start families before ~25/by the end of their 30s. $40k is a salary under which doing this is tight, but not impossible. Japanese companies also give pay bumps eventually of course, and are very loathe to fire (worker rights are strong in japan), with an engineer's salary of "only" 100k (which honestly was being paid to interns at FAANG 10 years ago) you could raise multiple families here. There is something called a "super salaryman" which is for salarymen who make ~$100k (1 million yen IIRC). Achieving this status is recognizable and makes a lot of things (getting loans, etc) easier -- that should say something about the mindset. It's still unclear if engineers in American are ridiculously overpaid, or if engineers in Japan and the EU are ridiculously underpaid. I lean towards the latter. [EDIT] - forgot something, it used to be common practice in Japan to pay people according to life circumstances (getting married, children, etc) or other things (lots of info here[0] though it doesn't directly cover this was something I learned studying in Japan in some undergrad Japanese management course). It would be naive to think people aren't paid slightly differently because of their life situation here though -- it's very easy to rationalize paying someone more because they have more "responsibility" at home/in society, and maybe arguably even morally correct. [0]: https://www.ilo.org/ifpdial/information-resources/national-labour-law-profiles/WCMS_158904/lang--en/index.htm https://www.ilo.org/ifpdial/information-resources/national-l...
- nsonha 5y ago
  > if engineers in America are ridiculously overpaid, or why do you only compare to Japan and EU? American engineers get paid more than anyone else (except for EU outliers). I make slightly above 100k in Australia, it's a bit tight with the housing situation and cost of living but it's liveable. Cost of living in the US is lower except for maybe healthcare but engineers get companies pay for them anyway. I don't have insights into other engineering, but I think software engineers are overpaid. Would I enjoy being overpaid? Of course, but it's hard to say it's fair pay considering what people in other professions are making.

darren_ 5y ago

Nitpick but you've repeated it in another comment so maybe worth correcting - 1 million yen is about $9k. 'Super salaryman' would probably be 10 million yen, I'd guess (haven't heard the term, but that doesn't mean much).

hardwaresofton 5y ago
Thanks for pointing this out -- yup, 10 million yen is what I meant there, I corrected it in the original comment

pezezin 5y ago

You are off by an order of magnitude, 1 million yen is ~9k USD. That's a ridiculously low salary here, fine for a college kid with a part time job ("arubaito") at your local konbini, but not much else. Maybe you got confused because China, Japan and Korea group numbers by powers of 10 000 ("man")? Now a 1000-man (10 million yen, around 90k USD or 75k EUR) salary would be amazing, the average Japanese salary is 3 million yen.

hardwaresofton 5y ago
Thanks for pointing this out -- > That's a ridiculously low salary here, fine for a college kid with a part time job ("arubaito") at your local konbini, but not much else. True -- min wage is 1000 yen, not hard to work out the lowest theoretical yearly salary would be with a 5 day work week. The usual exception of waiters that are below the min wage isn't here since the service sector generally doesn't do tipping. > Maybe you got confused because China, Japan and Korea group numbers by powers of 10 000 ("man")? Yup this is exactly it. Can't get used to dealing with that extra order of magnitude.
- pezezin 5y ago
  You're welcome. The worst part is trying to read out loud a number. It's fine when you see a number like 1億6432万4871 and you know exactly where the splits are, but most of the time they will just use commas as thousand separators and write numbers as 164,324,871, and then it becomes really difficult to parse numbers, even for them.
  - hardwaresofton 5y ago
    > The worst part is trying to read out loud a number. It's fine when you see a number like 1億6432万4871 and you know exactly where the splits are, but most of the time they will just use commas as thousand separators and write numbers as 164,324,871, and then it becomes really difficult to parse numbers, even for them. Yep, or trying to figure this out in front of someone you're making a deal with -- normally I'm all alone writing an estimate/invoice when I'm figuring out. Sales in japan is one part of the japanese business experience that I do not do, and avoid every time I can. Most of the time I just do everything in dollars -- Americans have a reputation for thinking of everything in American terms, so why disappoint? On a serious note though, a lot of local counterparties are fine doing things in dollars here as well.

imtringued 5y ago

>BOJ's enormous purse and very active involvement The BOJ is very inactive. Yes, the numbers are big but that money hasn't entered the economy.

hardwaresofton 5y ago
Claiming that the BOJ is inactive is either an indicator that you're an insider and I have no idea what I'm talking about (as an outsider am bamboozled by the magic trick/strong jawbones of the BOJ), or that you have no idea what you're talking about (with no disrespect). I don't mean to sound combative but this is such an extreme statement (in my view) that I'm eager to find which scenario is true. The BOJ is so active that we talk about the progression of the US in terms of "japanification" -- as in the US is going somewhere (in monetary policy) japan has already been. ZIRP, extended forever-QE, messing with whatever rates they needed to, buying JGBs, buying stocks. BOJ is not an inactive central banking institution. This doesn't even take into account the borderline conspiracy theories floating around on the way the BOJ exerts control(summed up by Princes of the Yen[0]). Could you explain a little more about why you think the BOJ's actions in the last like... 3 decades have somehow not "entered" the economy (which I don't think is synonymous with not affecting the economy)? [0]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p5Ac7ap_MAY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p5Ac7ap_MAY

unscaled 5y ago

Is Super Salaryman really a thing? I've only ever heard of this TV series[1], about a regular salaryman who becomes a superhero. Crossing the 1000 man (10 million) yen barrier is a thing though, I just don't know if it has a special name. [1] https://asianwiki.com/Super_Salaryman_Mr._Saenai https://asianwiki.com/Super_Salaryman_Mr._Saenai

hardwaresofton 5y ago
Yeah I really struggled to find anything about it, but it's a term I've used with people here... reaching out to ask some friends if maybe I got the term wrong.