What were you saying about the Japanese being busy?

Womacks23 Wrote:What were you saying about the Japanese being busy?

There is something extremely flawed by that graph. With the exception of college students who generally hold part-time jobs, I don't know of anyone in Japan who works less than a 50 hour work week

That graph must be based on hours paid, because that's only like 7 hours a day. Every single Japanese person I've known and/or worked with worked unpaid overtime. The illusion of course is that they're working hard the 16 hours they're at work, which doesn't seem to be the case all the time. Lots of my coworkers spend time napping at their desk, rather than at home raising their kids or being with their wives.

Japanese women going dateless and sexless doesn't surprise me. Japanese men aren't at all emotionally available, so intimacy seems like a tall order. This sounds kind of harsh, but every girl I've gone out with here in Japan has seemed desperate, clingy and had low self-esteem (evidently, as they chose to go out with me). It's probably not the worst place in the world to be if you're a female, but it ain't all that great either.

Javizy Wrote:Isn't that basically what they're doing now? Or would you say the majority of the 10,000 foreigners the government pays for each year are teaching/assisting with awesome English lessons while steaming towards N1?

I never said I liked the JET program, but at least its purpose is not to try to make the foreigners assimilate. I have read a theory somewhere, that its real purpose might not even be language education (since we all know how little it does to improve the level of English education in the country), but the lasting business partnerships that might be facilitated in the future by ex-JETs. In either case, right now the program does have an incentive to weed out the obviously delusional candidates, which might become somewhat diminished if they decide to drop the pretence of trying to educate Japanese schoolchildren about other cultures.

Quote:Anyway, isn't it more likely that such an influx would be from China and other Eastern countries as opposed to anime-obsessed Americans? Not that it sounds particularly likely.

Of course it is more likely. Which is why I called my scenario a "nightmare scenario" - I don't really believe that it's the most likely thing to happen.

Womacks23 Wrote:http://ic.pressflex.com/249.pressflex.ne....photo.jpg

What were you saying about the Japanese being busy?

Wow the Netherlands is freaking low @.@ I knew that we were lower than most of the other countries but not one of the lowest... heh nice :<

Womacks23 Wrote:*graph*
What were you saying about the Japanese being busy?

This absolutely shows how misleading statistics can be. As was said, this is a graph comparing the hours 'officially' considered work. Japanese people work overtime constantly, and don't register the overtime hours. My (sort-of) GF works from 9 in the morning to 10 at night, but she has never once registered for the five hours overtime she does every weekday. Nor does she count when she visits her customers on her 'free time' during the weekends. This is overwhelmingly common in Japan--it's expected at almost any company.

There's no comparison between American work ethic and hours worked versus that of the Japanese. The Japanese work harder and longer by a landslide.

Why do the Korean desk naps get included but not the Japanese?

http://www.oecd.org/document/22/0,3746,e...html#hours

I actually find this interesting because wages in South Korea have converged with Japan in recent years.

Shows trends in working hours too.

tokyostyle Wrote:For those of you that don't yet work in a Japanese office you can still see almost all of these processes in action. Just go get your foreigner registration card updated and watch how many people have to "approve" your address change. These things must be carefully checked you know!

The funny thing was I was going to post about something like this right after I read your post and then you hit it. Its all the things you mentioned as for why Japan has one of the most horrendously inefficient and slow bureaucracies I've ever seen. Getting an alien registration card takes nearly 3 weeks, but whats even stupider is you have to come back a day or two later after filing papers just to get the "certificates" which say "I'm waiting for my card." And all it really takes is for them to process your app and print them off, yet it requires you to come back 1-3 business days later to simply get it. It was un-freaking-believable.

Tzadeck Wrote:There's no comparison between American work ethic and hours worked versus that of the Japanese. The Japanese work harder and longer by a landslide.

Do Japanese companies fire employees for registering overtime? I can only imagine why they'd only report 'official' hours. Perhaps the not so 'official' numbers might violate some sort of human rights ethic. jk

I don't know if I agree about the "landslide" part, though. Law prevent American companies from functioning the way Japanese one's do. That aside, the lazy American stereotype doesn't even seem to hold up at fast food restaurants anymore. American's complain about work, but they still work... hard.

I've met people, who regardless of where they are, they're doing work -whether it be on a cellphone, pda, or laptop. I regularly meet couples who work 100+ hours each week and individuals with no days off. Hell, when I worked in tech support people thought you were weird if you just did the standard 40 and left.

I agree about the ethic, though. The idea behind the purpose of work in these two countries are so different that it's nearly impossible to compare.

Americaay me
Japan:サービス

@tokyostyle

LMAO.

Those who have had a job where you had to look busy know it is more work to look busy than to actually be busy. The hours drag on like weeks. Though, if you are doing something productive, the day seems to fly by.

If a Japanese salaryman is "volunteering" to be at the office, that is time he is not spending with his family or relaxing at home engaging in a hobby in comfortable clothes.

American salarymen do not get paid any overtime and there are people in Japanese business circles calling for Japan to adopt the same system.

tokyostyle Wrote:... giving daily status reports on work that only actually takes a few hours to do but is not expected to be completed until next week. As an added bonus after it is expected to be completed you have to pass it around to everyone for their personal approval and its well known this also takes several days.

While the other activities you listed are difficult to see in a positive light, I think there's benefits to giving status reports and gaining everyone's approval for your work. Daily status reports provide an opportunity for invaluable feedback. Likewise, the approval process functions as a filter for poor ideas and ideas that need revision. Of course, this is how things should ideally work. In reality, egos and politics probably get in the way. Anyway, sorry to continue the OT digression.

Womacks23 Wrote:http://ic.pressflex.com/249.pressflex.ne....photo.jpg

What were you saying about the Japanese being busy?

Netherlands, here I come!

vix86 Wrote:1) marry and 2) pop some kids out (See: Kids are $$$, espc. in japan).

Check out the details of the new tax deal. Sorta messes up the regular single/married couple, but pays for the old and young (families).

I think the part time thing isn't too bad (it just pays less). It's the full time stuff that scares me - especially, IT and co. The 'free' hours these guys doing hurts just to think about (a lot of people don't get their government promised overtime pay, unfortunately.)

bodhisamaya Wrote:Those who have had a job where you had to look busy know it is more work to look busy than to actually be busy. The hours drag on like weeks. Though, if you are doing something productive, the day seems to fly by.

If a Japanese salaryman is "volunteering" to be at the office, that is time he is not spending with his family or relaxing at home engaging in a hobby in comfortable clothes.

It's quite possible that work is their hobby. Work addiction is a problem as well.

@Peterhof.

Lol, you know English is freaken' hard! It's possible, but unlikely, that, unless the kids are seriously motivated, 2 hours of exposure a week (if your lucky) - whether that be 40 or 60 minute classes - doesn't really hit the spot. Most of us burn the midnight oil to get our Japanese up to standard, I don't think the kids have time for that really, with juku, friends and hobbies - well not unless you look at a 10-20 year time frame.

I do think, from what I've heard, that educating the kids from elementary level might help out - that's 6 extra years, meaning they can probably get to intermediate English by senior high school, which, to be honest, will get you conversant enough in English to have a pretty solid chat (if not a great one) with a native and allow you to go all the way for the touchdown. Then again, I don't really know. Chime in if you have an opinion guys.

Cranks Wrote:I think the part time thing isn't too bad (it just pays less). It's the full time stuff that scares me - especially, IT and co. The 'free' hours these guys doing hurts just to think about (a lot of people don't get their government promised overtime pay, unfortunately.)

Just to clarify, when I said "temporary" (I believe I mentioned it) jobs, I wasn't referring to part-time in the sense that "You can only work 20 hours a week," though that may be the case, I'm not sure. When I was talking temp work usually these are young people that apply to a company who basically contracts out its people to other companies for stents of time. This may be a few months up to 1-2 years. The problem becomes that law says after 3(?) years a worker can start gaining benefits which results in the company having to pay more for the worker so what usually happens is they fire them just before this deadline hits. So temp workers never get the benefits or the job security of "full-time (lifetime) employed salary workers" at some corporation. This leads to job stability problems, which from what I read also leads to women tending to avoid these men and so no families really. Japan has a lot of problems they need to work out.

@vix86
To add to the discussion, I'd just like to point out that contracting jobs in order to avoid paying benefits isn't just a problem in Japan. I can't speak for other countries, but it's the standard in academia in the U.S. As far as I know, contracted jobs are widespread in law as well. A recent NY Times article goes into some of the details. It's quite pitiful, actually. We're talking about PhDs and JDs working for a pay equivalent to an elementary school teacher but without the benefits. For the situation in academia, see this blog and for law, see this blog.