Japan’s lost generation is still jobless and living with their parents • Hacker News Board

Re: Japan’s lost generation is still jobless and living with their parents

#181

Post by acituan » Fri, Oct 02, 2020, 7:46 PM UTC

maerF0x0 wrote: post #127

I feel like the "Jobless and living with parents" pejorative is missing the mark. Jobless -- So what? If a country has figured out how to provide for its people w/o jobs, so what? For example if we had perfect AI-robot slaves we'd all be jobless. Would it be a problem? Maybe we should ask people why they want a job, maybe what they want to do doesnt require one? "Living with their parents" - Again, so what? Much of t…

> If a country has figured out how to provide for its people w/o jobs, so what?

Except no country has done that yet. We are far from full automation and most of the structural unemployment is due to emerging differential between labor demand and existing labor supply, not because we are in a state to provide everyone everything they want.

Also I want you to consider that a vocation is not only about covering one's needs, but also about our need to do something that matters for other people, with other people, to feel useful (vocation = calling). There is only so much need for every unemployed person doing arts and crafts, or another youtube channel to watch gadgets shredded in blenders or mentos put into a swimming pool full of coke. We deep down desire to do things that really matter, really meaningful.

> "Living with their parents" - Again, so what?

There is "living with parents because I value kin work and kin relationships" and there is "living with parents because I need to financially and psychologically". Meaningful participation in society requires having a degree of autonomy, individuation and agency. I would push even further; freedom from serious mental health problems, societally and individually, requires those. This is not an advocacy of hyperindividualism, it is about healthy ego-separation and self-actualization, which counter-intuitively also helps with social cohesion because it prevents ressentiment.

Re: Japan’s lost generation is still jobless and living with their parents

#182

Post by kiba » Fri, Oct 02, 2020, 7:52 PM UTC

maerF0x0 wrote: post #175

alxlaz wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What does this scenario represent that is _the actual problem_ of the matter? Among others: - Crippling depression for many of those who are jobless and living with their parents in a culture that is not exactly friendly to them. - An increased incidence of health issues that are correlated with depression and loneliness. - Decreased quality of life for elderly parents who need to support their children within the…

> Crippling depression I wonder how much of this is due to societal pressure vs actualization ? If the world's message is "you should feel bad because X" it seems unlikely to me that people would feel good about X. Having a job is a second order attempt to solve many of these things rather than solving the root issues. A job is a technology for solving an issue, I think it's time for a better technology.

The problem isn't job or jobless, it's the lack of social validation and self actualization.

People don't want to stay home and play video games all day. They want to be able to create, or master some sort of skills.

Re: Japan’s lost generation is still jobless and living with their parents

#183

Post by scarmig » Fri, Oct 02, 2020, 7:59 PM UTC

Saint_Genet wrote: post #49

I went to university in the same city I grew up in, and made the mistake of living with my with my parents for the first two years. Let me tell you, you don't really become an adult until you move out.

You don't really become an adult until your parents move in.

Re: Japan’s lost generation is still jobless and living with their parents

#184

Post by coolgod » Fri, Oct 02, 2020, 8:01 PM UTC

JohnBooty wrote: post #126

gsk22 wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is not true at all. Japanese Kanji comprise only a few thousand characters (~2000 being considered sufficient for functional literacy). Chinese has well over 50000 characters. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kanji https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_characters

I just realized something. I have no idea how one deals with the rest of the kanji one doesn't know. Upon encountering kanji one doesn't know, how does one find out the meaning? How would you "look it up?"

Do Chinese people even have dictionaries???

Re: Japan’s lost generation is still jobless and living with their parents

#185

Post by maerF0x0 » Fri, Oct 02, 2020, 8:03 PM UTC

kiba wrote: post #182

maerF0x0 wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Crippling depression I wonder how much of this is due to societal pressure vs actualization ? If the world's message is "you should feel bad because X" it seems unlikely to me that people would feel good about X. Having a job is a second order attempt to solve many of these things rather than solving the root issues. A job is a technology for solving an issue, I think it's time for a better technology.

The problem isn't job or jobless, it's the lack of social validation and self actualization. People don't want to stay home and play video games all day. They want to be able to create, or master some sort of skills.

> People don't want to stay home and play video games all day.

I totally get the sentiment and I agree.

I knew a girl once who really wanted to be a teacher. She had a hard time finding a job as a teacher though. I was discussing this situation with her and asked "What is it you want to do?" and she was like "Get a job as a teacher?" and so I probed further, "So you just want to get the job with title teacher, regardless of the duties?" And she was like "I dont care about the job and the title, I want to teach kids and see them grow" . To which i pondered with her, "so go volunteer as a tutor?" . Yes, she did want to earn an income, but her real goal and actualization was by doing the thing... She was able to do some tutoring in the meantime and it really really improved her outlook and was a great outcome for the kids too!

So often the things we want to do only have the barriers we've constructed/adopted.

Re: Japan’s lost generation is still jobless and living with their parents

#186

Post by neilparikh » Fri, Oct 02, 2020, 8:07 PM UTC

tasogare wrote: post #158

gfxgirl wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not a bribe. That's your negative spin. The positive spin is it's just 2/26th pre-payment of the rent for 2 years. You then pay 1/26th every month for 2 years, repeat when you renew your contract. Do I like having to pay 2/26th up front (2 months rent?) no. But I also would prefer not to have to put down payments on cars/houses.

You are wrong. Those fees are added to the normal rent, they are not part of it. I choose my current appartment in part because there was no additional "gift money" to pay. Each time one moves place those have to be paid, which makes moving quite costly.

I think gfxgirl's point is that you can mentally model the gift money as added on the rent, and use that number when comparing apartments.

Ex. 50/mo + 240 gift money (for a 2 year lease) == 60/mo without gift money.

Re: Japan’s lost generation is still jobless and living with their parents

#187

Post by tuatoru » Fri, Oct 02, 2020, 8:09 PM UTC

LatteLazy wrote: post #9

roenxi wrote: post #2

The things that stand out to me about Japan: * 3rd largest economy. * 11th largest population (top 10 until recently, they basically tie with Mexico). * If you look at a table of countries by area, they are there. Even in the top half, thanks to places like Tuvalu. I think there is a very strong on-the-face-of-it argument that they just have too many people and not enough for them to do, economically speaking. If the…

People here are disagreeing with you, but I actually think you're exactly right about most modern economies: too many people and too few jobs leads to all sorts of social issues from wealth inequality to excessive hours to crazy house prices.

> too many people and too few jobs leads to all sorts of social issues from wealth inequality ...

You have causation exactly backwards.

If poor people had higher incomes they would spend them. (In the jargon: "marginal propensity to consume declines with income".) That spending would create jobs and sustain incomes for other people like them. I know in my own case, if I had more money I would hire a personal shopper to buy my clothes, a cleaner, a personal trainer,...

Wealth and income inequality lead to stagnant societies where nobody is happy and most people are miserable.

Re: Japan’s lost generation is still jobless and living with their parents

#188

Post by kwillets » Fri, Oct 02, 2020, 8:15 PM UTC

asdasdasdas5453 wrote: post #42

brazzy wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's not how economy works. There is no such thing in general as "too many people for the economy". "The economy" is the sum of goods and services produced and consumed. Everyone who lives consumes, and could easily consume more. The economy is generally limited by the ability to produce, and is generally limited by the number of working-age people to do the producing. Unemployment can be result of production being…

On HN when people discuss CS/privacy/programming the conversation is very thorough and interesting. When the discussion is about economics (the topic I have studied at uni) most comments are just plain wrong and show a complete ignorance about the topic. If one wants a counter argument to "too many people for the economy" one can start here : https://www.jstor.org/stable/2523702?seq=1 "Using data from the Current Pop…

Re: Japan’s lost generation is still jobless and living with their parents

#189

Post by prewett » Fri, Oct 02, 2020, 8:19 PM UTC

JohnBooty wrote: post #126

gsk22 wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is not true at all. Japanese Kanji comprise only a few thousand characters (~2000 being considered sufficient for functional literacy). Chinese has well over 50000 characters. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kanji https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_characters

I just realized something. I have no idea how one deals with the rest of the kanji one doesn't know. Upon encountering kanji one doesn't know, how does one find out the meaning? How would you "look it up?"

Characters have a defined way of writing the strokes, so you look them up by number of strokes and radical. ("Radical" being, usually, the bit on the left or the top)

You can see a web-based example at [2]. Click on the "Radicals" button in the upper right. You'll see a list of radicals (sorted by stroke order), and clicking/unclicking on them will cause the list of kanji below to change.

[0] https://www.tofugu.com/japanese/kanji-stroke-order/ [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_kanji_by_stroke_count [2] https://tangorin.com/kanji

Re: Japan’s lost generation is still jobless and living with their parents

#190

Post by function_seven » Fri, Oct 02, 2020, 8:20 PM UTC

benrbray wrote: post #167

function_seven wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I suppose if you polled people in this situation, and just asked them, "Is this the life you want to live?", that would answer the your question. I don't know what the results would be, but I can guess that a large percentage of unemployed 30- and 40-somethings living with their parents would very much rather not be. Is it 10%, 35%, 65%? I'm guessing over 50% to be sure. You can argue that the society is set up wrong…

Playing devil's advocate, how many Americans would truthfully respond "yes" to the same question, "Is this the life you want to live?".

That's a really good point.

I guess I should have sharpened the question a bit: "Would you prefer to have a job and family of your own?"

And, to those who have those things: "Would you prefer to be single and live with your parents?"

I suspect the answers to #1 would be mostly "yes", and the answers to #2 mostly "no".