Japan faces headwinds in drawing foreign workers despite visa change

13 comments

1. The ppl who come here usually come for reasons other than money, career.

   They love anime and shit like that … then after a while face reality and leave.

2. Hahaha so they made it easier for foreign workers to come to Japan and face borderline abusive working environments. Nice try Kishi!

3. The weak yen and high taxes are the big things in my book. If the yen was at ¥100/$1 & taxes were more reasonable, Japan would look quite attractive for a lot of people. The safety, amazing transport system, culture, food, history, etc. fascinate a lot of people. (Not everyone is into manga/anime & games, by the way.) A lot of foreign investors and companies are taking an interest as Japan is relatively cheap and stable, with some growth at the moment.

4. They’ve gotta improve their working conditions if they want to attract foreign workers. Part of why their population is in decline is because young people there don’t have the time they need to develop relationships and have children, almost all of their time is dedicated to work or school, with little to no time for themselves. The language barrier also wouldn’t be a problem if they actually put more effort into teaching English or other languages, conversely it would also help if foreigners took time to learn Japanese language and culture, so that there would be fewer misunderstandings.

5. Apart from the abusive work environment it’s likely the manpower agencies in the middle take a usurious percentage of the pay as their fee.

6. Japan would be very foolish to allow too many foreigners into their country. If they don’t assimilate, they’ll become a problem in the future.

7. Japan has inherent dislike of foreigner. This also apply to Japanese descent who were born in foreign country and raised under that culture and then return to their parent’s home country for either a visit or move back permanently.

   Does native Japanese accept foreign born Japanese as one of them?

   See Wikipedia’s Racism in Japan.

   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Racism_in_Japan

8. Japanese companies don’t want to raise salaries and they don’t have to as Japanese workers will still work hard anyway, regardless of the low pay. This is the shikatanai mentality. And yes taxes are very high here, especially if you consider how little is coming back to taxpayers as social net and financial support unlike northern Europe, where taxes are similar or even a bit more but you get free education and a lot more social subsidies etc..

9. PR? Easy path to citizenship? Of course not.

10. I wouldn’t mind working in Japan but the main issue is xenophobia, I have a kid and the last thing I want them to endure is bullying because they’re not Japanese. I’ve seen plenty of interviews of non-Japanese kids who lived in Japan their whole lives but can never make any friends.

11. Japan could do more to treat its women better and give them more equality in the workplace. Less immigration would be needed if it’s more attractive to stay employed and not become a housewife and it might attract some more female high skilled immigrants as well who now probably opt for countries with a less misogynistic attitude.

12. They pay servers (not in any way saying servers do not also deserve their just due, but I have done both and wiring a building is MUCH more difficult than serving a table) almost twice what they pay tradesmen. No hope. They’re done. Stick a fork in ‘em.

13. The other day my in laws told me they saw a cop scream at a random Indian bicyclist who was stopped at a cross walk in front of a Koban to obey the rules because the Japanese people were watching him. He wasn’t breaking any particular rule.