Japan Needs Foreign Workers. It’s Just Not Sure It Wants Them to Stay.

33 comments

1. Here:

   [Japan Needs Foreign Workers. It’s Just Not Sure It Wants Them to Stay. – The New York Times (archive.is)](https://archive.is/20240805041023/https://www.nytimes.com/2024/08/05/world/asia/japan-foreign-workers.html)

2. [deleted]

3. The more reliant Japan becomes on foreign people the more bargaining power foreign employees will have.

4. Japan is a country where over 500,000 Vietnamese people are already living ..isn’t it too much ? Full stop. People usually talk about Chinese nationals in Japan, but those are mostly rich or at least earn more than the average Japanese people. Vietnamese, Indonesians, and filipinos are the problems. They were like living 1980 in their home countries and then come to Japan to cause problems.

5. Sure, corporations want more foreign workers as resource and keep wages down.

6. Clickbait title.

   The path towards citizenship is relatively easy if you have a clean record, can speak Japanese at a decent level and have a history of employment.

   If you can’t speak Japanese and don’t really bring much marketable skills into the workforce this isn’t really the demographic Japan is trying to attract.

7. There will be a progressive change, you cannot change society’s views in a few years specially when the biggest chunk of the population (and politicians) are 65+.

   The amount of foreigners, specially from South East and Mid Asia, will keep increasing. They might not want to offer long term visas, but as Japan becomes more dependent on them for work, contribution to the pension system, birthrates, etc. they will loosen up, but slowly as usual.

   As for the similarities to what is happening in Europe for instance (which is the biggest source of fear these days), Japan is an island and people cannot just come in droves without being stopped at the border. There will be certain thresholds related to education and well behavior for new entries.

   The biggest issue may happen as these foreigners stay “on the side” without getting immersed in the country and create their own parallel communities. Japan is a very hard country to fit in and even people who have lived here for decades trying to get immersed find out that they are never fully accepted.

8. It’s the same problem as in Europe. Germany is a good example. They took in a ton of Turkish “guest workers”, seriously thinking they’d all go back after a few years. As a result of this silliness, very little thought was given to either filtering for cultural fit or to helping them integrate. The net effect is still positive for Germany but it could be so much better.

   Japan has the advantage that the major sources of immigration (all in eastern and south-eastern Asia) are culturally more compatible. Still, they should think harder about the long game and assume that very few of these “guest workers” will ever return to their countries of birth.

9. Seems to be a lot of foreign interest pushing this heavy, because Japan doesn’t seem to want to follow the path of Europe and Canada. Very strange.

10. Japan is cooked

11. They KNOW they dont want them to stay, no matter how much they know they need them. Or at least not participate in society.

    If they could airdrop people in from other countries daily and then shove them back out at the end of the work day, they would

12. Love that this group has attracted so many expert economists 😆

13. Japan is smart. You get the overwhelming preponderance of the benefit of immigration from adult immigrants who leave for retirement, without the drawbacks. They needn’t destroy themselves the way the west has.

14. Easy… follow the Singaporean government foreign worker permits and clauses… they can only work in Singapore for like 2 “terms” and then they out … never coming back under the same work permit.

15. My antidotal experience here with younger JP is Japan has no future because foreigners will come and Japan will stop being Japan.

16. Japan needs progress in robotics/ai and longevity research, and all these fields are looking promising. No need to rush to solutions that have caused persistent problems elsewhere in the world.

17. After 11 years here this is my understanding and I’m ok with it.

    Come to Japan, learn and practice Japan’s culture and you’re more than welcome to stay.

    Want to impose your culture on Japan, there’s the door-

18. Weeaboos in shambles when their dream country doesn’t want them

19. Not like many want to stay there anyways lol

20. Japan needs immigration, this is not an option if they want to keep paying the pensions. If youngers see that pensions cannot be paid anymore they will just stop paying it or leave the country and the elders will die so it’s not realistict

    However they should spend some money and force the immigrant workers to assess government paid Japanese lessons and revoke their visa if they didn’t get a decent level of fluency past 2years

    In this case they can assure the new immigrant workers will integrate into society better and could build a healthy relationship with their host country

    Just telling people to come without assuring they can learn the language and integrate into society will lead to current western countries situation where you have multiple societies within the same country

21. Oh good, a 9-day-old, heavily reposted article that says nothing new and was probably 70% written by ChatGPT. Thanks for the post.

22. It’s sure it doesn’t. Fixed that for you.

23. Japan needs those doctors and engineers Europe are importing in their countries

24. Maybe multiculturalism is not answer and keeping Japan mostly Japanese might be the right move. Just look at the UK as an example or if they do intend on going down this path perhaps having more serve consequences and easier route for deportation they can keep the Japanese vibe.

25. They need foreign workers. Just don’t get the ones from MENA countries. Thoroughly filter the ones from the Indian subcontinent and South East Asia.

26. Japan needs to host 5.5 million Palestinians. They should stay for generations.

    This will solve the Two State Solution. Independent Palestinian State in the Far East🤣

27. So, Japan wants to be like Gaba?

28. To be fair, looking how it’s worked out in western countries they probably have a point.

29. I’m pretty sure they don’t want them to stay.

30. As long as the Japanese believe that foreigners commit 90% of the crime (I have no idea what that percentage actually is), the fear and racism would preclude Japan from achieving its full post-bubble potential. I do want to point out that those foreigners who speak and write Japanese fluently are noticeably treated better. If it makes you feel any better (no), they discriminate harshly against their own kind, burakumin, and those who are indistinguishable for the most part (Korean- and Chinese-Japanese) so it’s not always about race or ethnicity. It kind of reverts back to the nail that stick out gets hammered down thing – they expect people to conform to the norm.

31. A few days ago, after a few drinks a Japanese started telling me about what he saw as the increasing problem of, very specifically, Kurds in Kawaguchi. I had never heard of there being a significant population there, about 2000 apparently. He was showing me videos of foreigners being rude to locals, speaking loudly among themselves, throwing trash in the river at a BBQ, driving recklessly, being rude and not mindful of their environment when doing construction work. All in all it felt more like minor lack of civility rather than major trouble makers, yet it would be sad if Japan lost that high-trust society vibe at scale.

    Demographics is math though
    Math is truth

32. Huh, lived there 5 years total, had a wife and 3 kids. I lose my job and become too disabled to work. Told to leave the country and my family behind because they are Japanese. I am busy trying not to suck start a pistol, but it was all my fault and I deserve it huh. How dare I fall in love with someone outside my country. But sure this is ok to do because we do it too right? We are the cruelest species of animal in earth. And I have 0 hope in us “finding” something we know all about but try never to show; humanity. I’m scared for anyone who works there. They must adopt an emotionless and distant approach to anyone. It’s too easy to be ostracized and secluded there. Maybe our collective population decline is needed because we have yet to evolve empathy. I’m desperately trying to satisfy the requirements for a visa and somehow have $10,000 TO EVEN APPLY. I’m a mid age millennial, we die broke. I can rant for hours but I know it will be a waste of time. As long as one person sees the negative side of Japanese immigration. My family needs me. My 7 year old is convinced I’ve abandoned them and is acting out. My TWIN BABIES got pneumonia and still I stay. Trapped and suicidal at what has befallen me. But it’s my fault.. I never raped, abused, hurt, or tried hurting anybody. I spent great effort to learn the language, I gave a shit. But I will always be an unwelcomed gaijiin “outsider” not foreigner btw.

33. Marx warned us about economic migration.