Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Japan’s labor market is tight, and higher wages may be needed to retain workers

bloomberg.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

51–60 of 143 posts

Re: Japan’s labor market is tight, and higher wages may be needed to retain workers

#51

Post by fenomas »

eric_khun wrote: post #46
fenomas wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, but to some extent this is Japan in a nutshell - joining anything from a university circle to the neighborhood adult volleyball team does tend to come with new drinking buddies, albeit at varying scales. (And having said that, if you're single you can of course expect the volleyball coach to paternally try and set you up with that nice 24 year-old on the team...)

kinda related, how easy for a foreigners to play in the local volleyball team in Japan? I'm considering to move in Tokyo for a year or more, and would love to find some vball buddies

I see teams practicing now and then but I don't know how one goes about joining. But if you're eligible and the team has space, I wouldn't think being a foreigner will matter too much.

Re: Japan’s labor market is tight, and higher wages may be needed to retain workers

#52

Post by Sholmesy »

akg_67 wrote: post #42
patio11 wrote: post #2

Partly this is a recognition that Japan Inc. has historically awarded a blended compensation package which includes salary, benefits similar to most first-world countries, and a host of non-pecuniary terms which are not broadly enjoyed across all W-2 employees in the US. ("Expectation of lifetime employment" is a biggie; there are substantially more subtle terms, too, like "We're going to take care of you , and we si…

I actually know several instances of how company expects employees to sacrifice everything for the wellbeing of company and how company takes care of employees for life. One example, during 2008 crisis, the company my friend was working for 20+ years already, was in trouble and didn't pay employees for almost a year. My friend continued to work for the company despite it being bankrupt and him not getting paid for so…

Nice anecdote, and I'm glad your friend was made whole (and then some), but this is crazy. I wonder how many times the same scenario has played out, and the company continued to spiral into bankruptcy. Separating emotion from $$$ is important for this exact reason. He owes the company nothing. Maybe I'm being overly cynical though...

Re: Japan’s labor market is tight, and higher wages may be needed to retain workers

#53

Post by jsemrau »

raleighm wrote: post #33
patio11 wrote: post #2

Partly this is a recognition that Japan Inc. has historically awarded a blended compensation package which includes salary, benefits similar to most first-world countries, and a host of non-pecuniary terms which are not broadly enjoyed across all W-2 employees in the US. ("Expectation of lifetime employment" is a biggie; there are substantially more subtle terms, too, like "We're going to take care of you , and we si…

>> sourcing the bride To be clear, this is not at all normal in Japan either (at least not in Tokyo or Osaka or anywhere other than very small companies with septuagenarian managers). No one prices matchmaking services into compensation considerations. Agree generally with the rest.

"Sourcing" might be a bit string, but there are company organised outings for match making

Re: Japan’s labor market is tight, and higher wages may be needed to retain workers

#54

Post by 0xbear »

Yeah, I do get contacted by Japanese recruiters, and their comp in my field is pretty laughable by US standards. That said, the same applies to all of Europe as well. People literally seem to be making one third of what they'd be making in the US if they were any good.

Re: Japan’s labor market is tight, and higher wages may be needed to retain workers

#55

Post by nihonde »

adventured wrote: post #39

Japan's primary problem on income is that the economic ground they've lost in the last 20 years is vast. In the late 1980s, their GDP per capita was beyond that of the US. Now it needs to climb 50% to catch up. The last 20 years has taken them back to #16 among major economies in terms of GDP per capita. That gives you an idea of how difficult it's going to be for Japan to bring their incomes back in line with high p…

Lots of childless old-timers are sitting on hundreds of thousands to millions of dollars in liquid assets that presumably will revert to the state. Household savings in the 60+ demographic are exemplary. Of course, that's part of the reason the economy is stagnant.

Re: Japan’s labor market is tight, and higher wages may be needed to retain workers

#56

Post by timr »

delhanty wrote: post #40
dcw303 wrote: post #38

The problem is Japan has been in a deflationary environment for so long that they've forgotten how to bump up a price and turned into a nation of misers. I've witnessed first hand the collective hysteria when an ice cream company raised their prices by 10 yen[0] and also had to put up with coworkers banging on in excitement whenever 7-11 has an Onigiri sale dropping from 110 to 100 yen. Not to mention the queues stre…

>coworkers banging on in excitement whenever 7-11 has an Onigiri sale dropping from 110 to 100 yen Usually it's an up to 150 yen onigiri for 100 yen, so of course they're going to get excited. Edit: It looks like it is/was an up to 160 yen onigiri for 100 yen! That's a 37.5% discount! [1] [1] http://seven-eleven-mania-blog.jp/gohankei/5617/

It's still pretty silly, considering the absolute value of the savings.

My personal favorite along these lines is the way that a single building might have 2-3 floors of the same kind of restaurant (say, yakitori), but the one place that is 5 yen cheaper per item will have a line out the door, while the others are half-empty.

Re: Japan’s labor market is tight, and higher wages may be needed to retain workers

#57

Post by [deleted] »

Sholmesy wrote: post #52
akg_67 wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I actually know several instances of how company expects employees to sacrifice everything for the wellbeing of company and how company takes care of employees for life. One example, during 2008 crisis, the company my friend was working for 20+ years already, was in trouble and didn't pay employees for almost a year. My friend continued to work for the company despite it being bankrupt and him not getting paid for so…

Nice anecdote, and I'm glad your friend was made whole (and then some), but this is crazy. I wonder how many times the same scenario has played out, and the company continued to spiral into bankruptcy. Separating emotion from $$$ is important for this exact reason. He owes the company nothing. Maybe I'm being overly cynical though...

[deleted]

Re: Japan’s labor market is tight, and higher wages may be needed to retain workers

#58

Post by wolfgke »

0xbear wrote: post #54

Yeah, I do get contacted by Japanese recruiters, and their comp in my field is pretty laughable by US standards. That said, the same applies to all of Europe as well. People literally seem to be making one third of what they'd be making in the US if they were any good.

The metric that you have to consider is

salary - taxes - costs of living [including health insurance] + expected future revenues [in particular pensions]

Can you provide me evidence that, say, Germany, is so much worse than the USA with respect to this metric?

Re: Japan’s labor market is tight, and higher wages may be needed to retain workers

#59

Post by ShabbosGoy »

dcw303 wrote: post #38

The problem is Japan has been in a deflationary environment for so long that they've forgotten how to bump up a price and turned into a nation of misers. I've witnessed first hand the collective hysteria when an ice cream company raised their prices by 10 yen[0] and also had to put up with coworkers banging on in excitement whenever 7-11 has an Onigiri sale dropping from 110 to 100 yen. Not to mention the queues stre…

> The problem is Japan has been in a deflationary environment for so long that they've forgotten how to bump up a price and turned into a nation of misers.

My understanding is that the blame for this lies squarely with the Bank of Japan. The system was much more stable under the Finance Ministry.

Re: Japan’s labor market is tight, and higher wages may be needed to retain workers

#60

Post by ShabbosGoy »

nihonde wrote: post #55
adventured wrote: post #39

Japan's primary problem on income is that the economic ground they've lost in the last 20 years is vast. In the late 1980s, their GDP per capita was beyond that of the US. Now it needs to climb 50% to catch up. The last 20 years has taken them back to #16 among major economies in terms of GDP per capita. That gives you an idea of how difficult it's going to be for Japan to bring their incomes back in line with high p…

Lots of childless old-timers are sitting on hundreds of thousands to millions of dollars in liquid assets that presumably will revert to the state. Household savings in the 60+ demographic are exemplary. Of course, that's part of the reason the economy is stagnant.

Keynes vs. Hayek in a nutshell.
Post reply on HN