Japan and small living spaces

Jhnywalter · 15 Jun 2018

Very small rooms (only 151 sq ft) even according to Japanese hotel standards. Strange designs as if the rooms were unfinished with particle boards used as desk tops and bed with mattresses headboards. Even public areas had unfinished particle boards. When we asked the hotel management, they said it is the architects design but I noticed I can get some splinters just sliding my hand over the desk!

HanSolo · 16 Jun 2018

Short answer, OP, their culture generates that, due to the deference to the office rather than themselves.

There's no shortage of space or housing in Japan. Take a drive to Takayama, or go check out the outskirts of Nagasaki. Not only is space absolutely abundant, but unfilled houses are abundant too. If someone actually wanted, and was not picky about location, they could buy a nice spacious house for a mere $50k.

However because they have a particular programming: pile into Tokyo, and work long salaried jobs, they don't want that, and it's contrary to their goals. If they only wish to have a box to sleep in and wash themselves between office hours, there's no reason to have any space bigger than that.

This is why they put such a premium on how close a building is to a train station. They'd rather pay for easier office access than for a better home.

So whether that's "healthy" or not is a much more complicated question.

It's said that the education system is the biggest defect in the West. I'd say "office fetish" is the biggest defect in Japan, and it's whence all it's other problems come.

bentenmusume · 16 Jun 2018

HanSolo said:
Short answer, OP, their culture generates that, due to the deference to the office rather than themselves.

People wanting to live in urban areas where jobs (and entertainment, for that matter) are abundant is hardly limited to Japan. It's why Americans pay through the nose to live in and around cities like New York and Los Angeles, when they could buy a house on 100 acres for one-tenth the price in East Bumblefuck, Wyoming.

Of course housing is going to be cheaper outside of major urban centers, but good luck trying to convince your company to pay for your multi-hour bullet train commute from Takayama or Nagasaki unless you're a serious VIP (in which case you could probably afford comfortable housing in the Tokyo area anyway).

Also, to state the obvious, living close to a train station gives you better access to everything, not just the office. I mean, you can take that same train to go to restaurants, museums, parks, concerts, shopping centers, and the like, yes? Walking a mile or waiting twenty minutes for a bus in the rain or 90-degree summer heat isn't fun for anyone, whether or not you have an "office fetish."

Look, I'm not saying that Japanese work culture doesn't have its issues (it absolutely does) but suggesting that all issues regarding the availability and cost of housing could be solved if only the Japanese people weren't mindless office drones is just grossly oversimplifying and stereotyping the situation.

HanSolo · 16 Jun 2018

jt_ said:
good luck trying to convince your company to pay for your multi-hour bullet train commute from Takayama or Nagasaki

The issue is the centralization pressure. Why doesn't that company have offices in those cities? Why wouldn't work people do in those cities have sufficient value to be justifiable?

The deeper reasons do come back to attitudes towards work, lack of innovation in work culture, and excessive deference to the collective (usually the company) over the individual. The centralization of amenities is just a byproduct of that, so the fact train stations are more convenient for everything still misses the point: why is that? There is excessive and injurious centralization pressure in Japan.

The small living spaces are just one symptom of the problem, but they also indicate the other parts of it. You cannot raise a family in a box, and you couldn't move outside the city with your family to get access to cheaper living (to accommodate them), because your job restricts it.

And that's ignoring some of the truly disgusting attitudes regarding transfers. I knew a newly married man transferred overseas, and without his wife, and he just took it. I explained to him that in my country, that would cause an automatic quit-on-the-spot, a boss doing something like that would destroy his reputation, and possibly even risk his safety if he did it to the wrong guy, but this Japanese guy couldn't even comprehend any of that. They just view themselves as powerless extensions of their companies.

jt_ said:
suggesting that all issues regarding the availability and cost of housing could be solved if only the Japanese people weren't mindless office drones is just grossly oversimplifying and stereotyping the situation

Yes, in my opinion, it would fix most of them. If even 10% more started to think for themselves, express their wants and needs, and started to say no, all of the other problems would start to dissipate.

Problems with availability and cost of housing in a spacious country with rapidly receding population is just a sign of fundamental cultural defects that have nothing to do with real estate. And stereotypes are just pattern recognition.

I suppose to be constructive, I should raise a few ideas as to what they could do:

Improve the focus on skills and results. Skills & results-based reputation empower the individual (decentralizing), company loyalty empowers the company (centralizing).
Provincial rebellion (not literally). I.e. provinces and cities reducing their support and co-operation with Tokyo.
Reducing reliance on university as a test of people's worth. Businessmen could start applying their own skills & knowledge tests, rather than deferring to degrees and big names.
Change the child-birth incentivization schemes to tax percentage-point based rather than lump sum, and increase them. I'd imagine even the stodgy old conservative men in government could agree to that: "make a lifetime tax payer, get a lifetime tax discount".
Increase proportions of land-value or property taxes, and devolve more income tax rate setting power to the provinces
Get the emperor involved. He's always been a cultural leader of some variety, even back in the days of the Shogunate. If he starts handing out medals for family achievements (like in Russia), and sets out his vision for how Japanese people could fix their problems, they'd listen.
Adopt technology. Japan is high tech and has high speed internet, and the internet is a decentralizing pressure. But they're not adopting it enough because they still place too much value in the big, long, face-to-face meeting, when the rest of the developed world sees meetings as a waste and actively fights against them.

Glenski · 16 Jun 2018

No way are you going to get a figurehead emperor to do anything beyond symbolic and traditional,

Reducing reliance on university as worthwhile is also generally pointless with a population in decline. Unis are now almost at the stage where you have 100% acceptance rates because they need the money. Not all jobs demand a uni degree, to be sure, but many that do are also just figurehead positions gotten more from the OB network than credentials. Make GPA a necessity!

Adopting technology would seem a no-brainer, wouldn't it? But so much office work is still mountains of paper nowadays! How do you break that tradition in the land of so-called technology?

HanSolo · 16 Jun 2018

Glenski said:
No way are you going to get a figurehead emperor to do anything beyond symbolic and traditional

Yes it'd need an amendment to give him some powers back (not too many, obviously). But the point is he's the Emperor of Japan. He's supposed to care what happens to the thing because it's "his" and his family's country. And the prime minister is mostly concerned with short term issues rather than long terms ones, due to the nature of the job.

Glenski said:
Make GPA a necessity!

The first thing they should do is fix one error: universities setting their own exams. The exams should be set by industry participants only. Then scores would actually mean something in the marketplace. But this is a global issue, not just Japan.

Glenski said:
Adopting technology would seem a no-brainer, wouldn't it? But so much office work is still mountains of paper nowadays! How do you break that tradition in the land of so-called technology?

It's because of the office fetish. Japan is anathema to workplace efficiency, because more importance is placed on just being in the office and doing office stuff, as opposed to results. So naturally, pushing pieces of paper around is preferred. Getting rid of all that paper and digitizing things would put pressure on work to be results-based, would increase frictional unemployment, and generally disturb the status quo.

But if offices were more spread out, and there were more remote workers, and companies were focused on "get your best work done, then go home at 5pm", the less tenable the paper pushing and meeting-room vegetating would be, which would put pressure on getting rid of them.

bentenmusume · 17 Jun 2018

HanSolo said:
Yes it'd need an amendment to give him some powers back (not too many, obviously). But the point is he's the Emperor of Japan. He's supposed to care what happens to the thing because it's "his" and his family's country. And the prime minister is mostly concerned with short term issues rather than long terms ones, due to the nature of the job.

Oh. I just realized that you're the guy from this thread.

Yes, if only the emperor would wake up tomorrow and tell his loyal subjects not to be such mindless worker drones (and get rid of kanji while he's at it), all of Japan's problems would melt away, transforming it into a wonderful utopia like all those Western countries where people think for themselves, express their wants, and say no, where naturally there are no societal problems whatsoever.

I have to say, I almost admire your ability to hold such passionate, unwavering opinions about a subject you clearly do not understand particularly well.

jt9258 · 17 Jun 2018

jt_ said:
Yes, if only the emperor would wake up tomorrow and tell his loyal subjects not to be such mindless worker drones (and get rid of kanji while he's at it), all of Japan's problems would melt away, transforming it into a wonderful utopia like all those Western countries where people think for themselves, express their wants, and say no, where naturally there are no societal problems whatsoever.

You are joking!!

HanSolo · 17 Jun 2018

jt_ said:
Oh. I just realized that you're the guy from this thread.

jt_ said:
Yes, if only the emperor would wake up tomorrow and tell his loyal subjects not to be such mindless worker drones (and get rid of kanji while he's at it), all of Japan's problems would melt away, transforming it into a wonderful utopia like all those Western countries where people think for themselves, express their wants, and say no, where naturally there are no societal problems whatsoever.

Yeah a lot of this ^ happens on internet forums. Frankly nowadays internet forums are becoming increasingly scary. Not only do people react to differing opinions, or people daring to criticize and ask questions, with character attacks and false declarations of the interlocutors opinions; but people actually bookmark and make mental notes about "those who've dared criticize". Not just in this case, but all over the place: even in internet communities with wildly different topics.

Added to ignore.

Usually westerners though. It's something to do with the new generation coming up out of the colleges in North America etc. Borderline psychotic in some cases. There's an increasing trend of not responding to differing opinions with intellectual discussion, but emotionally freaking out instead.

Rest assured that I have no love for the west, and certainly no particular like for westerners. Indeed I stopped hanging out in foreigner bars a long time ago, because they're always the most dangerous and least tolerating of differing opinions. Straight up psychos a lot of them.

The whole reason I care about things like this topic, is because Japan is an incredible, awesome place, which I'm so happy exists. But (1) it hasn't always had as much of the problems mentioned, and (2) anyone can see that if it continues in this direction, serious problems are going to happen in the future because of basic maths.

jt9258 · 17 Jun 2018

HanSolo said:
Yeah a lot of this ^ happens on internet forums. Frankly nowadays internet forums are becoming increasingly scary. Not only do people react to differing opinions, or people daring to criticize and ask questions, with character attacks and false declarations of the interlocutors opinions; but people actually bookmark and make mental notes about "those who've dared criticize". Not just in this case, but all over the place: even in internet communities with wildly different topics.

Added to ignore.

Usually westerners though. It's something to do with the new generation coming up out of the colleges in North America etc. Borderline psychotic in some cases. There's an increasing trend of not responding to differing opinions with intellectual discussion, but emotionally freaking out instead.

Rest assured that I have no love for the west, and certainly no particular like for westerners. Indeed I stopped hanging out in foreigner bars a long time ago, because they're always the most dangerous and least tolerating of differing opinions. Straight up psychos a lot of them.

The whole reason I care about things like this topic, is because Japan is an incredible, awesome place, which I'm so happy exists. But (1) it hasn't always had as much of the problems mentioned, and (2) anyone can see that if it continues in this direction, serious problems are going to happen in the future because of basic maths.

Could not have said it better myself.

tsugiwajapan · 3 Jul 2018

the more you pay, the more your space will be bigger

DavidChiang · 16 Jul 2018

HanSolo said:
The whole reason I care about things like this topic, is because Japan is an incredible, awesome place, which I'm so happy exists. But (1.) it hasn't always had as much of the problems mentioned, and (2.) anyone can see that if it continues in this direction, serious problems are going to happen in the future because of basic maths.

Thanks for your honest words "HanSolo", that's exactly what you can observe in Japan. Even if a few stubborn idiots still blindly defend this beautiful nation, Japan has massive problems to solve on many different levels, or it will become as meaningless in the near future as it was in 1950. Any system that is so rigid in its form must sooner or later fail, and this unwritten law applies to all. It is sad to see how a once brilliant nation is slowly but surely sinking, only because the will to reform is lacking.

johnnyG · 16 Jul 2018

jt_ said:
Yes, if only the ~~emperor~~ President Xi would wake up tomorrow and tell his loyal subjects not to be such mindless worker drones ..., all of ~~Japan's~~ China's problems would melt away, transforming it into a wonderful utopia like all those Western countries where people think for themselves, express their wants, and say no, where naturally there are no societal problems whatsoever.

Does that seem like a fair transformation?

diligentcircle · 16 Jul 2018

bentenmusume · 16 Jul 2018

I wasn't really planning on returning to this thread, but since someone had to come and "disagree" with me... I'm sorry, but was it not clear that I was being sarcastic?

One of my pet peeves is people grossly oversimplifying things related to Japanese culture based on stereotypes and a lack of actual experience. Are there problems with the Japanese work culture? Sure. Could Japan benefit from decentralization? Absolutely.

Is solving this problem as simple as saying "Oh, if only the Japanese people weren't mindless worker drones who can't think for themselves because their education system trains them to be emotionless, office-centric robots."...? Of course not, and anyone who has regular meaningful interactions with Japanese people would realize this.

Every modern society has its fair share of problems, and the solution is rarely as easy as an outsider would assume it is.

I'll reserve further comment, but I do think it would be nice if people would think twice before making sweeping statements suggesting "Oh, all of Japan is like this." "All Japanese people think the same way.", and so on, and so forth.

Quite frankly, it's not only misleading to newcomers, but also rather insulting to the Japanese members who do frequent this forum.

tomoni · 16 Jul 2018

DavidChiang said:
Thanks for your honest words "HanSolo", that's exactly what you can observe in Japan. Even if a few stubborn idiots still blindly defend this beautiful nation, Japan has massive problems to solve on many different levels, or it will become as meaningless in the near future as it was in 1950. Any system that is so rigid in its form must sooner or later fail, and this unwritten law applies to all. It is sad to see how a once brilliant nation is slowly but surely sinking, only because the will to reform is lacking.

Hello DavidChan

1) I am not sure who the blind idiots are that you are referring to. Most of the posts in this thread focused on broad sweeping statements starting with the OP about japan not living up to some particular standard.

I do think that anyone blindly defended this nation and as a few poster explicitly stated japan is not perfect/ has issues and so on ...

You said

it will become as meaningless in the near future as it was in 1950

Care to elaborate, or clarify ? Frankly, I find your comment to be offensive.

DavidChiang · 18 Jul 2018

tomoni said:
Frankly, I find your comment to be offensive.

I basically take the right to say what I think, no matter if that suits some morons or not! This is especially true if it is the pure truth! :emoji_angry:

tomoni · 19 Jul 2018

DavidChiang said:
I basically take the right to say what I think, no matter if that suits some morons or not! This is especially true if it is the pure truth! :emoji_angry:

So you are now call me a moron, or implying that I am a moron, because I find your comment offensive. The problem with that you are able to avoid backing up your claims.

So since you are obviously not a moron, rather than engaging in name calling, perhaps you could enlighten me as to:

"it will become as meaningless in the near future as it was in 1950"

1) how Japan was meaningless in 1950
2) how this is the pure truth

HanSolo · 20 Jul 2018

Lol what the hell ... it doesn't matter! Whether you're some nut or you're the one in the right, it's just a paragraph of text coming through the internet.

There's no better response to rude person on a rampage than hitting the ignore button.

On a side note, someone here in this thread has been active since 2005 and only started posting this year... :emoji_confused:

Grandpa Frank · 20 Jul 2018

I agree with you HanSolo , the sudden new postings from him all seem more like he belongs on an "I Hate Japan" forum. He is on the "Possible Troll" watch list and unless his negative and downright rude posts change , the ban hammer may have to come out.

tomoni · 20 Jul 2018

HanSolo said:
Lol what the hell ... it doesn't matter! Whether you're some nut or you're the one in the right, it's just a paragraph of text coming through the internet.

There's no better response to rude person on a rampage than hitting the ignore button.

On a side note, someone here in this thread has been active since 2005 and only started posting this year... :emoji_confused:

Thx for your reply Han

I noticed that as well, but the ignore button is my last choice. As to what does it matter, because rude people lowers the quality of threads. Ignoring only makes the problem go away for me, but leaves the mess on the forum which discourages others from participating.

Cheers

Toritoribe · 20 Jul 2018

I already gave infraction points to his posts in accordance with the forum rules, so he is temporary banned now. (This is the first time I used the "hammer".)

Glenski · 21 Jul 2018

It is sad to see how a once brilliant nation is slowly but surely sinking, only because the will to reform is lacking.

I have to ponder whether that remark refers to Japan or the USA? Ever see this?

Japan and small living spaces

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