RResidents in Japan

What does everyone here think life will be like in Japan in 10 or 20 years when an entire generation passes away?

Is Japan really on a downwards slope?

42 comments

  2. Lots of small villages will be empty. They are so desperate for young people to move there. Hopefully some will. Also so many artisan and locally produced wonderful goods will be gone.

  4. Depends on your definition of pretty much every word in your question.

    I think that in 10-20 years the average income in Japan will be lower in comparison to other Asian countries. But the culture will be more or less intact, and because there are so many Japanese companies that are huge in pretty much every category you can name, change will be slower than many people might hope.

  5. With fully automated driving, little izakaya vans running around Saitama will be packed with old men.

  6. With population decline, I think more people will coalesce into the cities. Small villages might be abandoned first. More automation, more robot servers, maybe relaxed immigration.

  7. More tourism (and thus tourists) and a shift away from a traditionally domestic-focused attitude in business ^(at least in my industry) towards export oriented.

    A lot of games, anime, and entertainment content is still being made with Japan as the target demographic, but bit by bit that’s changing. The recently released Forspoken is one such game.

  8. I am thinking of leaving. Japan is on a downward slope back to how it was before the bubble. I see no bright future for Japan. And Japan is no place for a single, white dude to grow old.

  9. Hopefully, in 10 years’ time, we can get through life without the fax machine.

    In all seriousness though, I think in 10 or 20 years time, a lot of the rural area in Japan is just going to be ghost towns one after the other. Probably will not even take that long.

  10. I have no idea. I really hope I’m in a different job though because putting myself through uni for a second time better be worth it.

    In 20 years, I’ll be 63. I will still be working because I doubt I’ll be able to retire then and even then the chances of me being able to retire within ten years of that is likely slim.

  11. “Is Japan really on a downwards slope?”

    Depends if you live on a hill or not I suppose…

    What’s with all these doom and gloom posts of late?
    (No not the “how do I divorce my Japanese wife?” ones)

  13. Gay marriage will finally become legal after the current generation of old farts in the LDP have all finally died off.

  15. Depends.

    The good.
    In 10 to 20 years, the worthless leaders of the country will be dead.

    The bad.
    The worthless younger generation will be leaders.

    The ugly.
    Social welfare systems collapse due to the inverted triangle population effect and the country becomes a dystopian society where nothing works and no one knows how to fix it.

  16. 10 years ago my senpai said he’d be shocked if Japan is still here in 10 years, but uhh… Still here…

  17. Its pretty bleak.

    Just a short ten years from now Japan is on a course to being about 7 million people smaller than it is today, which is insane.

  18. Different, but not radically so. Capitalist practices seem to be on an arc that bends toward increased exploitation. Who knows how long that trajectory will last.

  20. It’s probably going to be tough.
    As is already happening, smaller rural areas are going to be hit pretty hard. Most are now anyway, as the current populations are already small, within there 80% plus will be of retirement age. The small amount of working age and capable of making families age people will move to the city for employment and education opportunities. And with that goes schools closing down/coalescing because of low student numbers. (All of this is happening now btw)
    Small local economies will shutter, property value will go down further discouraging movement, furthering the need to group into hub cities.
    But lots of landowners are all old, don’t know who owns what, empty/abandoned structures that the government can’t touch, choking the real estate market and safety issues.

    Again, as is already happening, retirement age is still going up, sucking all of the resources out of the working age, bleeding the working age dry with no guarantee that the same benefits will be there when they retire (it won’t). Need for services for them will sky rocket. But care jobs are undesirable, pay terribly, abuse will likely rise even if they can manage to get people. So 社会問題 there.

    Wages are still stagnant, probably won’t go up anytime soon either. This isn’t taking into account recent inflation problems either. Japan is already damn near completely reliant on all resources from foreign sources so if there is a major shift in geo political powers that could cause even more pressure on the regular people, further squeezing the working middle class.

    People always say let more immigrants in, but a lot of countries that are sending immigrants are having more of them just take it back to their home countries now. This also happened in nagano with optical tech, 精密, etc. So that isn’t really viable as a population solution either.

    TLDR; the countryside will continue to wither, real estate is fucked, population squeeze, education system on the lower level will be strained, etc etc. Problems all around I don’t think the government or anyone involved will be equipped to tackle until they stop circle jerking themselves.
    But oh wait, that doesn’t matter because we’re already rich and regular people problems don’t apply until they potentially affect my own bank account.

  21. It will be awesome for some people, shitty for some people, depending on where you live and what you do for a living.
    Same as today and 20 years ago, really.

  22. For all the doom-saying since the bubble popped (~’90), I think japan has done really, really well. It has maintained lifestyles and living standards, near full employment, and zero inflation (yeah, I know, even some deflation–but not much).

    And in spite of headwinds such as a graying population, declining working age population, (and the late 90s SE asia currency crises, the bursting tech bubble then, and ten years later america’s banking/property crisis, and so on) it has maintained consistent GDP numbers throughout–and tho critics might ask “where was the growth”, IMO having maintained such a remarkable degree of stability for the last 30+ years is no mean feat.

    Where some might ask, “well, what did they really do”, the counter question would be “what did they (very) successfully avoid”. Housing is affordable–compare even korea next door, where generational wealth is needed for kids to buy their own places (or Aus/NZ, and so on).

    blah, blah, blah…

  23. A lot dirtier, the army of old people that spend the early mornings cleaning the streets will be gone.

  24. Less people = more houses = cheaper rent

    Less people = more jobs open = higher wages

    Less people = less low skilled workers = more automation

    less people = less pension for boomers = i don’t care really

    I see nothing but benefits, and no reason that barriers to living / working in Japan should be changed / made easier. A foreign workforce is purely to make magic GDP number go up forever.

  25. It’s already well on it’s way down that slope. Has been for the past twenty years, if not before.

  26. There will likely be some level of exodus from major cities as infrastructure from work at home increases in reliability, and the older generation of CEOs resisting such changes decreases. This is the best solution to the overburdened childcare situation in large cities is to decentralize the population. Many rural areas are already pushing reclaimed properties where they build a new house with clean energy sources like solar panel roofs and eco friendly construction, either selling outright or offering low rent for small families. They also have a slew of properties that are on sale from 650k yen to 1mil yen ( $5k-$7.5k~) that will likely attract those who want to leave the city life who already have a small savings.

    The towns along major highways in the boonies will likely slowly develop more, and you may see some smaller large cities on the outskirts of tokyo where the housing is still packed, expensive, and tiny begin to decay as people split between the high city life and the rural inaka life.

    It’ll be interesting to watch. Japan will likely be the first industrialized nation to go through the population crunch, followed soon by South Korea and China. No one really has a good idea of what exactly will happen, as any similar population change in other countries has been driven by industrial changes or environmental changes.

  29. The countryside will be hollow, completely gone. Even ok small cities will decay and fade.

    Anywhere not a significant urban hub will be an absolute ghost town. Communities just wiped out.

    This is already happening, but a cliff is coming that will wipe out horrifying numbers of small communities. The entire infrastructure will die and the property and land will be near-worthless.

  30. When the lion’s share of the Boomer Generation dies, there will be a serious conversation about how to transition all these domestically trained day service workers and nurses into other vocations.

    Nothing will actually be done about it, but the conversation will begin.

    Also, since it seems a given that there will be more pandemics in the near future, you can all but guarantee that stressed caretakers will begin having accidental day service measles parties.

  31. As someone who has been here for over 30 years: some things will change, some things will stay the same, and Japan will continue to shuffle along.

  32. Less healthy, tbh.

    My wife’s grandmother lived to be 98. She rarely ate meat, walked everywhere, and was always busy making friends.

    How many people live like that these days?

  33. A lot of young Japanese people are actually optimistic about it. Like they would be able to afford an apartment at last. Also, it would be easier to make a career for younger people, as promotions are usually based on tenure and seniority in traditional corporations,

  34. I actually think that there will be more of an exodus from Tokyo to more affordable cities, like Nagoya, Sapporo and Fukuoka. The housing market in Tokyo is ridiculously overpriced. I mean I am already seeing it happen in Fukuoka. Where a lot of Tokyo expats are moving and setting up businesses here. 10 years from now, even if more real estate opens up in Tokyo, nobody will want to lower prices.

  35. I live in a small town- half of it is traditionally a farming village and half a fishing village. In 20 years my absolute ideal would be more established groves of fruit and nut trees lining the hills, less runoff from pesticides and fertilizers running off into the ocean, and the younger people keeping up the abundance of rice paddies and veggie farms. (Anyone else feel like rural Japan is kind of like the shire? Just massive amounts of puttering around and tending the veggie patches.) Ideally, our local elementary school at least would still have enough kids to operate.

  38. The economy has been supported by central bank policies that can’t by sustained. There will be a crisis but it’s debated what will happen.

  39. In 20 years maybe things will change more. In only 10 years, it’ll still be the same old farts making policy decisions, etc.

    But in 20+ years, I honestly see Japan starting to lose its identity more than ever… or rather, it’s identity will change drastically from what we know now, as kids stop taking up the same culture of the Salaryman, of saving face, of the customer is god masks warn by service workers, etc.

    It’ll be interesting times.

  40. A lot less people in trades.

    A lot of carpenters, plumbers and the like are getting pretty old now.

    The system is rough for a newbie because generally the “senpais” foist all the hardest labor on the young guys, but I kinda think people who get into the trades now will be doing a lot better than your typical sales job in 10-20 years

  41. The second I get hired at a tech firm with remote (work anywhere in JP) “PEACE!” to Tokyo. I’d love to live in Fukuoka, Kobe, Kyoto, or Osaka for a few years.

  42. I think tax on foods, and articles will be 28% with no discrimination because Japanese people don’t fight nonsensical policies, and are very agreeable when it comes to government, or what they see on TV. Politicians: *Please help us ruin your lives with more tax, and nonsense!* Japanese: *Shoganaina–*

    Utility companies will hold more power than the underground gangs.

    Bahhh, bahhh.

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