In Japan, older buildings are much poorer quality than new ones. They don't survive earthquakes well, they have no insulation in the walls, they're really quit

In Japan, older buildings are much poorer quality than new ones. They don't survive earthquakes well, they have no insulation in the walls, they're really quite horrible. Building standards are constantly rising, so newer units are almost always better than older ones. Brick buildings don't exist in Japan. Any such structure would quickly collapse in an earthquake. Any older buildings that still exist were either exceptionally well-built for the time, and/or were retrofitted to meet modern earthquake standards. So some historic buildings are still around because they're valuable for cultural or historic reasons, but this doesn't include housing built in the last century.