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Japan Begins Experiment of Opening to Immigration

bloomberg.com

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Re: Japan Begins Experiment of Opening to Immigration

#111

Post by hh3k0 »

Complexicate wrote: post #99

The Bloomberg article exacerbates the bigotry many Japanese have against their own fellow citizens. In the caption of the first picture: "She’s not all Japanese, but she was Miss Universe Japan 2015." Yes, she is "all" Japanese. She grew up in Japan, with her Japanese mother, attending Japanese schools. This is the subtle bigotry toward people who are "half" (as they're called in Japan) rather than "dual". Many Japan…

> Yes, she is "all" Japanese. She grew up in Japan, with her Japanese mother, attending Japanese schools. This is the subtle bigotry toward people who are "half" (as they're called in Japan) rather than "dual". Many Japanese will always consider them "less Japanese" or outsiders.

Just because she qualifies as Japanese from your point of view doesn't mean that the Japanese have to view it like you. White savior complex much? I've spoken with Japanese friends about hafus and their point of view was that people do not materialize out of thin air, but rather are the genetic conglomerate of their ancestors (which is hard to argue against) and thus links in a chain -- which would make her less Japanese. And that seems fine to me, as long as she is not discriminated against for being viewed less Japanese.

Re: Japan Begins Experiment of Opening to Immigration

#112

Post by coldtea »

Complexicate wrote: post #99

The Bloomberg article exacerbates the bigotry many Japanese have against their own fellow citizens. In the caption of the first picture: "She’s not all Japanese, but she was Miss Universe Japan 2015." Yes, she is "all" Japanese. She grew up in Japan, with her Japanese mother, attending Japanese schools. This is the subtle bigotry toward people who are "half" (as they're called in Japan) rather than "dual". Many Japan…

>Yes, she is "all" Japanese. She grew up in Japan, with her Japanese mother, attending Japanese schools. This is the subtle bigotry toward people who are "half" (as they're called in Japan) rather than "dual". Many Japanese will always consider them "less Japanese" or outsiders.

That's her culture and nationality (and even the culture part could be dual). They refer to her ethnicity and ancestry.

Re: Japan Begins Experiment of Opening to Immigration

#113

Post by coldtea »

philliphaydon wrote: post #37
duxup wrote: post #24

It will be interesting to see how Japan deals with it culturally. From folks I know who lived there they said that while everyone was nice, it was always clear that they were very much outsiders.

I would never want to work in japan. Doing business with japan is hard enough. You could create the most amazing service in the world. And it’s still inferior to a Japanese business on the grounds that it’s not owned by the Japanese. I love the country the culture the people. But working with Japan is the most difficult thing I’ve encounter in my career.

>You could create the most amazing service in the world. And it’s still inferior to a Japanese business on the grounds that it’s not owned by the Japanese.

So like US people were proud for their "Made in America" stamps?

Re: Japan Begins Experiment of Opening to Immigration

#114

Post by coldtea »

philliphaydon wrote: post #74
sanxiyn wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This sounds normal and not specific to Japan.

14 years in this career and Japan is the only country I've had to do this with.

Have you changed timezone storage and displayed dates wrong (even if it was a configuration issue) in many other countries/customers?

Re: Japan Begins Experiment of Opening to Immigration

#115

Post by coldtea »

Pmop wrote: post #9
benjohnson wrote: post #2

Im conflicted about this - I enjoy the multicultural aspects of my own town (Seattle) but I also sympathise with this idea of having a home culture.

I'm not only conflicted. I'm annoyed. Immigration is being sold as a solution to aging and shrinking population. While opening to immigrants certainly helps solving the shrinking workfoce problem, it is nothing more than a duct tape over what is happening: people no longer want to have kids. After it's been long enough that immigrants are not even called this anymore, if we discover that young workforce is still shri…

>* it is nothing more than a duct tape over what is happening: people no longer want to have kids.*

Yeah, and the idea is: "Let's replace them with other people, from other cultures".

Re: Japan Begins Experiment of Opening to Immigration

#116

Post by TulliusCicero »

barry-cotter wrote: post #101
jdietrich wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

UN forecasts suggest that the global population will plateau at between 9 and 11 billion by 2100 to 2150, followed by stasis or a very gradual decline. IMO, those are excellent numbers - more than large enough to launch an interplanetary civilisation, but manageable within the resource constraints of Earth. I'd be worried if the population was forecast to shrink below a billion, but that's highly unlikely on any reas…

The UN forecasts are ridiculous at any long term timescale. They assume that desire for children is not heritable so everywhere will undergo the demographic transition and just somehow magically the world will reach replacement fertility and stay there. In reality the share of births to women who already have 4, 5, 6, 7, 8+ children has been increasing in the US for over a decade and the ultra orthodox have gone from…

But the US has been at or under replacement rate for births overall for a long time now.

I'm an exmormon, birth rates are higher for Mormons, certainly, but even they've been obviously dropping. I had three batchmates out of 9 in the missionary training center with 10+ kids in their family. That used to be relatively common, now it's almost unheard of for newer families.

Re: Japan Begins Experiment of Opening to Immigration

#118

Post by gaspoweredcat »

GreaterFool wrote: post #18

> but it’s no longer quite right to call it homogeneous Are you sure? Japan is maybe 99% homogeneous? I live in central Tokyo and I can go on for days and days without seeing a foreigner! > it will inevitably introduce social strains Sadly, yes. I've observed this on few occasions.

really? when i was in tokyo/kyoto/osaka foreigners were everywhere although ill admit in my more recent trips it seemed to be less westerners and more chinese tourists, however when i went further north to sendai and aomori i didnt see a single other foreigner

Re: Japan Begins Experiment of Opening to Immigration

#119

Post by laurieg »

ioltas wrote: post #36
laurieg wrote: post #10

I thought it might be useful to add a comment mentioning what the changes are in layman's terms. Prior to the recent change, everyone working in Japan was a "skilled" worker. There was no language requirement and essentially anyone with a degree was eligible. This didn't cover manual labour jobs etc. But at the same time, many young people were out working in convenience stores, fast food restaurants etc. Turns out t…

> This is true. In fact, by far the fastest route to permanent residence in Japan is marriage. You can get PR in 3 years if you are married to a Japanese national vs 10 years if you aren't. More details on that. Getting a wedding visa the first time gives 1 year. At the second application one year later, one gets once again 1 year. At the third application one year later, you get 3 three. At this point, you could ask…

Another interesting part of getting PR by marriage: you only have to live in Japan one year. You could get married in another country, live there 2 years minimum and then move to Japan and get PR after only one year of residency.

Re: Japan Begins Experiment of Opening to Immigration

#120

Post by gaspoweredcat »

sanxiyn wrote: post #67
GreaterFool wrote: post #18

> but it’s no longer quite right to call it homogeneous Are you sure? Japan is maybe 99% homogeneous? I live in central Tokyo and I can go on for days and days without seeing a foreigner! > it will inevitably introduce social strains Sadly, yes. I've observed this on few occasions.

How can you know? Can you reliably identify Koreans from Japanese?

this is really not difficult as a general rule
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