I am currently working at an eikaiwa. I make 285k but the hours suck, stress is high, my boss is nuts and I am pretty miserable. Since moving here I haven’t been able to see any of Japan because of work and I’m always tired and grumpy from the environment I’m dealing with at work.
I am thinking of switching over to ALT work so that I’ll have more free time and less stress. It would be a decent pay cut taking me down to 240k. I am willing to take the pay cut for my overall happiness and sanity but I am worried if that salary will be livable. I live in a major city (not Tokyo) so things aren’t super cheap. I’d like to be able to travel around Japan on weekends and breaks without scraping the bottom of the barrel every month. Those currently on this salary or less, how is it budget wise?
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You’re in the best situation to know this… Only you know if you can live with a 40,000 yen pay cut.. We don’t know your expenses and investments. Personally, I think the average person could do it, but would struggle.
I’m not in the situation anymore but I remember my pay cut moving from eikeiwa to ALT. I prefer it. To make up for the pay difference I worked part time.
Work it all out man! Take that 240k – rent – average utility bills – average food spending – health insurance – city tax – any other expenses = how much you’ll have left over for you to spend/save
To be honest, there’s not that much of a difference is quality of life between 280,000 and 240,000. You’re poor either way.
As an ALT you would have a lot more time and less stress
Many ALTs do part-time Eikawa work too. 5 hours a week at an Eikawa on the weekend or at night and you will be making as much as you do now.
I do want to say that if you become an ALT, use your free time wisely. Use it to get more skills, certiicates, licneses, degree etc.
You’re not making 240, they only advertise with it but that’s not what you’re getting.
They cut pay during vacations and don’t pay in between contracts.
You’ll only be getting paid about 10 months of the year.
You can live single on that salary (as long as you’re getting it every month) if you do without some things: cook at home; don’t drink often; don’t pay for subscriptions and the like. When you travel, take the cheapest transport and stay in ryokan and the like (bearing in mind the cheapest ones sometimes do not have online reservation systems and the like and you’ll have to call them).
I wouldn’t want to live on that little, but I could if I were young and not thinking about the future.
You know your own standard of living and spending habits better than anyone here. Could you live a life that makes you happy earning 45k less than you do now?
I did this. Workweek dropped to 4 days instead of 5. Did wonders for my mental health. BUT, I’m also the secondary income earner in my family so we were ok with the pay cut.
Take a look at / ask for ALT postings just outside of the major cities, often you will get a salary bump of 2~4man. It might be worth it, plus if you move there rents are lower and you’re just an hour by train from the city.
If you don’t already have an ALT job lined up, a few things to keep in mind while searching:
* make sure the ALT position is for 5, not 6 days (aka “5.5” days)
* confirm number of vacation days will actually give you time to travel. I’ve heard of people who only have 10 vacation days a year and have to be at work during school vacation (doing absolutely nothing!) lest their pay get docked
* confirm social insurance details – who pays for it?
How much do you have left at the end of every month currently to put into savings?
Is it 40k or less? Then you’ll be hurting.
Is it 80k or more? Then you’ll be fine.
You know more about your needs than we do.
Just remember that less stress is not guaranteed as an ALT. You might be taking a pay cut and end up with more stress
Just get out of Japan .
Something that no-one has mentioned here that may be worth considering is that working can cost a lot of money, particularly if there’s a lot of travel and long hours.
Consider something like food. If you’re in a regular 8am to 5pm job you fry a couple of eggs for breakfast, have them on a couple of slices of toast, then throw some ham between another couple of slices of bread with a lettuce leaf (to create the illusion of being a functional adult concerned with having a balanced diet), and you’ve got breakfast and lunch for maybe 250 yen (maybe a bit more if you’re one of those people who buys the doorstop sized 4-slices-in-a-pack bread, personally I like the 8 to 10 slices to a pack).
Now if you’re on an irregular schedule you dash out the door, stop by a combini to grab a burger or something plus a coffee or tea (which sets you back 500+ yen right there), then you go to the combini again for lunch and get the same, and you’re sitting at 1,000+yen for breakfast and lunch. And if you’re working past dinner time you’re probably looking at another 750 yen for a full bento for dinner. … and you’re probably still hungry and have eaten stuff that’s really unhealthy.
Food alone can set you back a 20,000+ more a month when you’re working a crazy schedule, plus all that fast food can leave you feeling pretty lousy after a couple of months.
What I’m getting at here is that working a crazy schedule can end up costing you a lot more money in some unexpected ways that most people don’t stop to think about because they’re rushed off their feet and while they **could** make breakfast and lunch they often don’t because they’re just too busy. You end up paying the convenience store premium because you don’t really have time for anything else. And that adds up.
So while the drop from 280,000 to 240,000 may make your budget tighter, you might also find that you’re saving money in a lot of areas too by not working a crazy schedule. It depends on how you’re living now, but I did this for a couple of months myself before I checked my finances and realised that I was spending a lot more to make only a little more, and I was in worse physical and mental shape. I shifted jobs to a slightly lower paying job that had a more regular schedule,got my schedule straightened out, tightened up my budget, and stopped dropping by convenience stores while rushing from place to place and … I actually ended up with more money in my bank account at the end of the month.
If you do, use the extra time as an alt to better yourself as a teacher or another profession so you can quickly find something better.
Went from full time eikawa to part time ALT (3.5 days), and the dispatch company pays me a salary every month so I have ALOT of time off…with private students and some other part time gigs in the evening I make more than I did at full time eikaiwa…very happy with the move.
This sub became from teaching in Japan to survival in Japan.
I did both ALT and eikaiwa. You’re not guaranteed stress free ALT. When my company lost my first city’s contract I moved from doing three awesome schools in two weeks to four schools in one week, and it sucked ass. I quit for eikaiwa, fortunately I had a great boss and coworkers there though.
Finding out where you’ll be working BEFORE accepting would be the best if possible, all mine were a train + bus ride away so long commutes to different sides of the city every day were the norm.
You should use a calculator to see how much money you make a month (after taxes) and subtract it by how much you spend. If the result is more than 45k then, congratulations, the pay cut will be livable.
Be aware that as your resident tax is assessed based on the previous year of income, you’ll be paying a resident tax rate calculated on 285k from your new salary of 240k for a year.
ALT is the way to go, eikaiwa is so high stress it’s not even worth it tbh. I’m getting around 240k too, and August/December salary is also the same as it’s prorated.
*Ignore if you’re super passionate about teaching in Japan*
My advice, stop teaching. Pretty much all teaching jobs in the country are underpaid unless you’re teaching at a high level, international school or well paying Eikaiwa. Refocus on your passions and the reasons you came to japan and find a better career path before you’re stuck as a low paid teacher for ever
Another thing to consider is what your savings situation is like. Remember things like residence tax and health insurance etc are based on your previous years salary. So even though your earnings will go down your tax and insurance etc will stay at a higher rate for a year. Do you have enough to cover that? If not I’d hang on for a bit and build up some savings to cover that before making the switch.
A lot of alt positions do also tend to be further out in the countryside so you could save money moving to a more rural location too, but that might involve moving. Usually alt positions won’t cover moving costs so would you be able to afford to move it necessary? If you are going through a dispatch company they usually can’t guarantee a specific location so it’s somewhat likely you will be expected to move if offered a position.
I think if you want to see a lot of Japan, why not move to a different prefecture with your ALT job? Explore it for a year, and then move again. Low pay sucks, but it gives you the freedom to swap jobs whenever it suits you. Being willing to move means you can apply for any job in Japan, and small town companies often help you find accommodation. If they are going to give you 240, they should give you good holidays, which means largely being off when you don’t have classes. A small city, or country town will be very cheap, making up for you lower salary.
If you are living in a larger city, it is often easier to do part time work than get an increase in pay. You might be willing to put in some extra effort at work, maybe do some extra hours for 10000 yen a month, but it might be easier to do a 2 hour business English class every Wednesday, for example, and at 3500 an hour, that is 28000 a month.
Leave the Eikaiwa. You can always go back to another Eikaiwa, and even if you went and found another Eikaiwa job for 270 somewhere, it sounds like you would be better off.
You may find temporary relief in ALTing but you’ll be stuck in an endless one year contract cycle. Contrary to popular belief, JP government jobs like direct hire ALTs are not subject to the 5 year permanent employment rule. This means that if you’re an ALT they will have you by the balls with infinite renewal anxiety on top of your pay cut. Make the future you a favor and get yourself a different job that pays as much or more OP. If it looks too good to be true it’s because it is.
All year round salary of 240k is very high for ALT work (except JET).
Whether or not the salary is livable will depend on where you live and your lifestyle. Calculate your living expenses, figure out your essentials, and where you might have to cut things. See if it’s enough.
I will say that I wouldn’t limit myself to looking for only ALT jobs because there’s no guarantee that being an ALT will be better. If you want to keep teaching English, you can look for other companies, different eikaiwa, daycares, etc. Make sure you fully understand the terms and conditions of the job. There are better jobs out there and some of them are even teaching jobs but you need to be proactive and fight for yourself at interviews/contract signing to avoid another bad job.
I would say go for it. More free time is always nice
Is that 280,000 before taxes, health insurance, and pension? I’m assuming not, so you aren’t actually making 280,00, you’re likely around 230,000. Would the ALT work you’re looking at mean you’d have to pay your own health and pension? If so, then you’d better subtract a bit more, since paying it yourself is more expensive. On a 230,000 salary I am thinking you’d come home with less than 200,000.
That might be ok for a just out of college kid who mostly stays home on weekends or hangs out at friend’s homes drinking cheap beer and eating cup noodle, but not so good for an adult who has responsibilities and wants to save money for the future.
To add to what others have said. Travel can be a major expense when you are working at multiple English school branches/or multiple schools as an ALT, however it is usually likely that the number of students schools (often just one depending on location and dispatch company) as an ALT will be less than that of an Eikaiwa, plus your schedule will be far less crazy which allows you to better plan meal schedules, and available time to go out and do/see stuff (especially as you will have all (might be wanted for ocassional school events such as school festivals) your weekends free. Down side being that depending on your daily class schedule/how much the JTE’s want/need you in their classes/other things you get given to do such as check/mark students work/or whether you are T1 or T2 (although 99 percent of the time you should only be T1 if you end up in a Senior High School), you may have alot of desk warming time on some days, bit this can be a good time to further your Jaoanese learning etc depending on how flexible your school is with you doing this (but most are usually fine with you doing this). The other downside is (other than with JET I believe), although you do get public holidays and school breaks I.e. Summer, winter, spring breaks off work, these will be unpaid so you need to budget for these times. Another upside however, is in relation to meals, where you can choose to eat the same school lunch daily as the students, which is super filling, well balanced, and excellent value for money as they only cost about 300-350 yen a lunch, when you consider as a Eikaiwa with a horrible schedule, you will spend alot more on food/snacks, much of what you not be very healthy or balanced. I have not worked as an Eikaiwa as of yet, however from everything I have heard and read about those positions, although they do give you the opportunity to earn more (if you give up all of your freedom and freetime) I would far rather stay as an ALT based on the amount of freedom it gives me. Plus as you said, because you have no free time, you havnt been able to see much of Japan. As an ALT have had plenty of time to indulge in travel, seeing numerous Japanese festivals (especially as most of the important ones fall on a weekend which you usefully don’t have free working at an Eikaiwa), and in general have a good work/life balance in regards to eating, sleeping, and usually not feeling stressed out.
I changed to ALT so I could study and have more free time. 230,000 in Tokyo. It was survivable but I did a few nights a week part time to help out, and would sometimes work Saturdays and so on. I actually did alright some months when I wanted to or got the chance to work more, I could come out with like 300,00, and I’m lazy.
You can also find casual work in the holidays.
This is one reason the ALTs in poverty doesn’t ring totally true for me, when I was doing it everyone had side gigs.