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Foreign business owners are scrambling to raise capital to stay in Japan

tokyopaladin.substack.com

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Re: Foreign business owners are scrambling to raise capital to stay in Japan

#171
post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm explaining why Japan is doing this. A lot of people don't understand why Japan would do this when their population is already declining. It's because to the working class, a declining population isn't the most pressing issue. In fact, some of them may even want that because it means more resources to everyone else. Mass importing immigrants causes many issues for locals. Anyone who denies this is simply virtue si…

> Anyone who denies this is simply virtue signaling. Dismissing other opinions in words but not arguments is vacuous. Fabricating and attacking their motives is more evidence (not fabrication) that the argument is nothing but bias plastered over with empty words. So is the parroting of the talking points of some social tide. > quality Human beings are not low quality or high quality - and especially not based on your…

  Dismissing other opinions in words but not arguments is vacuous.
Meanwhile, you dismissed the will of Japanese people as "hateful" for not wanting more immigrants.

Re: Foreign business owners are scrambling to raise capital to stay in Japan

#172
post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think they're the kind of people who would argue that the "immigrants" should be kept out, but "expats" are ok.

Yes, a country should want to keep out people with negative fiscal impact and bring in people with a positive fiscal impact. Isn’t that obvious? By all means bring in people to run businesses in Japan. Legitimate businesses, not visa mills. This increase in capital requirements stamps out the visa mills.

> This increase in capital requirements stamps out the visa mills.

No, it doesn't. The rich people abusing the system just deposit more money and get their checkmark. Small businesses cannot raise and float this kind of cash quickly.

Also, the policy change is being applied retroactively to visa renewal applications that had already been filed, before the policy change was even announced. So if you filed a few months ago, before any of this was announced, now you're getting rejected and sent home. If the govt was actually interesting in getting rid of illegitimate businesses, they could just go to them and see if they're real or not. All businesses that qualify someone to get a business manager visa have to be in commercial spaces, with signs with their name on it, and accessible.

Re: Foreign business owners are scrambling to raise capital to stay in Japan

#173
post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They are not just asking for more money, from TFA they are imposting additional requirements like better Japanese fluency etc. In general they are raising the bar for who is allowed to live there, and all of that protects Japan.

No, that's not required for this visa. The capital requirement is the major change. Also, foreign restaurant owners are already fluent in Japanese, because they deal with Japanese customers every day. The language requirement change is for other visa types. The rich people abusing this visa as second home have no trouble depositing a bit more money to meet the requirement. It only affects legitimate businesses that c…

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Re: Foreign business owners are scrambling to raise capital to stay in Japan

#174
post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, that's not required for this visa. The capital requirement is the major change. Also, foreign restaurant owners are already fluent in Japanese, because they deal with Japanese customers every day. The language requirement change is for other visa types. The rich people abusing this visa as second home have no trouble depositing a bit more money to meet the requirement. It only affects legitimate businesses that c…

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Re: Foreign business owners are scrambling to raise capital to stay in Japan

#175
post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, that's not required for this visa. The capital requirement is the major change. Also, foreign restaurant owners are already fluent in Japanese, because they deal with Japanese customers every day. The language requirement change is for other visa types. The rich people abusing this visa as second home have no trouble depositing a bit more money to meet the requirement. It only affects legitimate businesses that c…

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You crossed into personal attack with this comment. That's not allowed here, so please don't.

If you wouldn't mind reviewing https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and taking the intended spirit of the site more to heart, we'd be grateful.

Re: Foreign business owners are scrambling to raise capital to stay in Japan

#176
post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

You crossed into personal attack with this comment. That's not allowed here, so please don't. If you wouldn't mind reviewing https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and taking the intended spirit of the site more to heart, we'd be grateful.

Gaijin is not a personal attack, it means foreigner. So perhaps there was a misunderstanding, otherwise, could you point out the personal attack?

Re: Foreign business owners are scrambling to raise capital to stay in Japan

#177
post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You crossed into personal attack with this comment. That's not allowed here, so please don't. If you wouldn't mind reviewing https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and taking the intended spirit of the site more to heart, we'd be grateful.

Gaijin is not a personal attack, it means foreigner. So perhaps there was a misunderstanding, otherwise, could you point out the personal attack?

It was more obvious before you edited the comment (and in principle we appreciate it when people edit their comments to dampen or remove personal attacks), but the bit that begins "Do you live there?" and ends "boot such gaijin out" is still saying much the same thing. You can make your substantive points without getting personal like that.

Re: Foreign business owners are scrambling to raise capital to stay in Japan

#178
post #177

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Gaijin is not a personal attack, it means foreigner. So perhaps there was a misunderstanding, otherwise, could you point out the personal attack?

It was more obvious before you edited the comment (and in principle we appreciate it when people edit their comments to dampen or remove personal attacks), but the bit that begins "Do you live there?" and ends "boot such gaijin out" is still saying much the same thing. You can make your substantive points without getting personal like that.

I'm at a loss here tbh because that sentiment is what the article is about. But yes I did edit the comment to make it less personal and more about the sentiment that has led to these changes in the VISA requirements.

Re: Foreign business owners are scrambling to raise capital to stay in Japan

#179
post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wouldn't call it a loophole but a compromise. If you want to attract skilled labour, you must allow them to bring their dependents. They come as a unit.

It’s not just dependents. It includes parents and siblings of both the skilled immigrant and their spouse. And, transitively, cousins, etc.

Just speaking for the US:

- Immediate relatives of US citizens have no quota. Immediate relatives include children under 21 (it's complicated), parents and spouses only;

- Siblings of US citizens have a quota. the wait is almost 20 years currently;

- Unmarried children of US citizens and green card holders who are over 21 have a wait of 8 to 20 years depending on country of birth;

- Spouses of green card holders and unmarried children under 21 of green card holders have a wait of 1-2 years generally;

- Married children of US citizens have a wait of 10-25 years;

Additionally, the president has broad powers to limit giving visas (nonimmigrant or immigrant) for consular processing thanks to Trump v. Hawaii [1] that mostly cannot be challenged in court. There are various bans on this for 19, 39 and 75 countries. It is unlikely many of these people will not be able to get a visa at all at least until Trump leaves office.

Immigration has become a political scapegoat for many things from housing prices to crime to unemployment. There's no evidence of any of this. Housing is particularly funny. Migrants (undocumented or documented) aren't the reason your rent is through the roof. Also, migrants of any type commit fewer crimes on a per-capita rate than US citizens [2].

If you want to look at actual immigration abuse, I'll give you two examples:

1. There are credible allegations Elon Musk was out-of-status after leaving Stanford [3]. This matters because, if true, it makes him ineligible to adjust to an employment-based green card and, by extension, it means he can be denaturalized. USCIS under this administration is more aggressively pursuing denaturalization. Do you think that includes Elon Musk? Yeah, me neither;

2. Melania Trump, a model from Slovakia, came to the US on a tourist visa in 1996 and allegedly worked on that visa, which is unauthorized. She later got an EB-1 green card in 2001 [4], colloquially known as an "Einstein visa". Again, unauthorized work here would make her ineligible to adjust status and could be grounds for denaturalization as well. Do you think USCIS will pursue that? No, me neither. Also, she engaged in the Republican sin of "chain migration" by sponsoring her parents in 2006.

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trump_v._Hawaii

[2]: https://siepr.stanford.edu/news/mythical-tie-between-immigra...

[3]: https://stanforddaily.com/2024/11/11/elon-musk-stanford-work...

[4]: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-43256318

Re: Foreign business owners are scrambling to raise capital to stay in Japan

#180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh yeah, the management companies bill insane amounts. The beach house I mentioned in the sibling sub-thread - they'd bill $100 to change a lightbulb, stuff like that. It only made sense as a medium-term investment - buy with cash, maintain for a decade (and maybe you're cashflow positive for part of that), then sell for a profit (hopefully). Similarly, local to me, renting a house really only makes sense if you boug…

The returns just don’t really make sense for me, but I’m not a CPA. The returns don’t seem substantially better than an index fund, it’s a headache to deal with, and if housing actually becomes affordable then you’re upside down (and the govt might air drop cash on upside down mortgages, probably not if you’re already paid off). Not my forte though and I hand-waved the hell out of that math, maybe I’m way off. Just f…

No you're correct. I think the only thing you're missing is that the risk profile is entirely different from an index fund. The hit you take on returns might be worth it to you as a hedge against disastrous market conditions.

Also if your business is real estate then you probably operate more efficiently due to integration and scale plus the rental could be part of a longer term redevelopment plan.

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