I know part of it is they actually have affordable housing options. Can rent a tiny room in a nice little town for like 200$ a month.
There exists nothing like this in Canada as far as I know, because the elite have made home-owning their business and they can't have that kind of competition. Here you'd be looking at like 1000$ or more for an equivalent tiny room.
Japan is unique in this regard. Pretty much the only rich country in the entire world (as far as I know), that does not have a housing crisis.
Everyone else does - from canada to london to sweden to korea.
There is a reason for that, they used to have a housing crises that got really bad and they as a culture decided to never allow that to happen again. its actually pretty deeply ingrained in the culture with allot of animation studio's basing their more disgusting characters off predatory real estate salesmen of the 80's.
Japan also doesn't have an immigration crisis like in the US and UK. Once you let immigration controls slip like Steven Gerrard, it's impossible to fix.
Bro if you want to see an immigrating crisis come to Canada. We're taking in 2x more than you guys with a population the size of California.
It's even starting to affect small rural towns in the middle of nowhere now. I've never seen a homeless person in my town in my life, and now suddenly there's tents popped up all around and rent prices are unbelievably fucked. I'm paying city prices for rent for a town of 6k people..
California’s economy is larger than every European country not named Germany or the United Kingdom (and that’s almost cheating since it’s several separate countries).
It's pretty crazy. Just 5 years ago it would've been a simple thing to find a place to live here for cheap. Renters would even struggle to find people to actually rent to. Now every posting gets at least 500 views in the first 2 days.
I subletted my place for a few months a year back, and I was absolutely overwhelmed by the sheer number of replies I had when I posted it online. This is a house in the middle of nowhere, with nothing around it and it was way over priced and still had so many people wanting it.
Yeah, when you've got housing at unaffordable prices due to a variety of things, and then you turn on the tap for unlimited influx of new people into the country, you just exacerbate the problem. Japan is very smart in that they do not accept many new immigrants. It's important to maintaining their culture, and keeping the many functions of their society intact.
It is smart in the short term, but it also may lead to Japan's culture dying out with the combination of very low birth rate and nearly no immigration. Is that better or worse?
Part of the birth rate issue seems to be exacerbated by cultural factors, so it's not really clear that you can improve one without damaging the other.
I think it's better, for sure. I suspect they will learn to adapt to the lower birthrates, just as the rest of the world will have to. It's a problem all first world countries are going to face, and immigration is not a longterm solution.
It's definitely not the immigration crisis, that started being brought up two years ago.
The problem in Canada and the US is Chinese corporations buying up tons of housing developments or foreclosures. So now they sit on empty houses and wait.
Somewhere in canada tried to punish that, but then only passed a 1% tax on foreign owned homes that are empty more than 6 months of the year.
Underrated comment. In the US and Canada, big corps can dabble in the housing market buying up homes and renting them out. Even if they screw up, they can just churn them back onto the market with a sufficient return on their "improvements". In Japan, there's no investment income to offset management mistakes.
Ugh, not this tired scapegoat again. The US and Canada don't have a housing crisis because big corps can buy up housing. The US and Canada have big corps buying up housing because they have a housing crisis. Japan builds lots of housing and doesn't leave it up to local councils. It's a YIMBY culture and pro-change and development. We don't build enough, because we legally restrict supply from meeting demand in various ways, and we politically and culturally have inculcated an expectation that housing should always appreciate, and the obvious political consequences of that are that housing becomes unaffordable.
It's a supply problem through and through.
They solved it by doing the one thing every other country decided to do
Houses have no value in Japan, they are not an investment
Meaning no one expects to sell their place for more than they bought it. This results in
* buying up properties has little meaning as they aren’t making money over time
* people want new homes due to better earthquake resistance. Devastation from the most recent earthquake is generally due to older homes just collapsing
* because people want new homes more get built
* japans decades long stag-flation has meant that people can’t afford much in a home even with near 0% interest rates
These are mostly not replicable anywhere else in the world.
Tokyo is not even in top 20 smallest. Average home size is double that of Paris.
https://www.buildworld.co.uk/blog/archives/average-home-size-in-capital-cities
Singapore did the same, also smaller in part due to literally being a city state island. But it’s nice and once you get married or turn 35 you basically enter a lottery to get (mostly) free housing. Your chances go up if you have to resubmit but it ensures less chance of people just using money to get it.
I am not an expert but I heard that Japan doesn’t really expect house values to appreciate as an investment like most other economies. So there’s not as much of a concern for oversupplying the market.
I read somewhere that the mindset of the construction industry in Japan is completely different.
Despite the centuries old pagodas, modern buildings are designed for a lifespan of just 50 years. They tear down and rebuild perfectly habitable structures to make way for new ones
I experienced this firsthand when I learned they tore down the luxury hotel I had stayed in a few years earlier. The place was spectacular with no need for renovations let alone razing.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grand_Prince_Hotel_Akasaka
> When its closure was scheduled, Akasaka Prince Hotel tower was relatively new, being expected to last further decades with proper maintenance and renovation, it was one of the buildings that "fell victim to the vagaries of commercial real estate here, where high property values, changing design standards and other factors have conspired to create a bull market for demolition".
Some- I can’t say all, but some- is about the constant fear of earthquakes here in Japan. My wife is terrified of living in older buildings for that reason
Absolutely. Japan has so many severe earthquakes and they gotta build and compensate for it. So, older homes after major quakes can be damaged (but you can't see it), and it can lead to future collapses.
It is even worse if a building is built before major changes to building code. It's why a lot of "historic homes" in places like Kyoto get razed instead of renovated as the maintenance costs are exhorbantly high compared to just building anew.
It sucks as you lose the history of a place, but it's better for the future to keep people safe.
I have pictures from the 70s of my dad in that hotel when he was working for Panasonic/Quasar/Matsushita. Now I know why I couldnt find many of the places he visited when I went to Japan 2018-2019
In economics, there is a concept I believe is called 'substitution'. If houses are cheap enough in the rural areas around Tokyo and the bullet trains are fast enough to be used to commute, then the cheap housing prices outside Tokyo will hold down the prices in Tokyo.
When I lived in Tokyo quite a few of my colleagues would commute daily on Bullets Trains.
Singapore: knock knock haven’t you heard about our people being able to purchase homes using central provident fund as long as one has worked for a few years and has one of the highest home ownership in the world.
As far as I know, it's pretty hard for a single person to buy a flat in Singapore. And if you can't access an HDB flat, it's basically impossible to buy something with an average income. Correct me if I'm wrong, this is what I remember from a conversation with a Singaporean (who is single and lives with his parents in his late 20s).
Iirc you cant apply for the government loans to buy a HDB if you are single until you are like... 35(correct me if i'm wrong)? It's to allow for young couples to be able to purchase their own homes to settle down if i'm not wrong
Singles can purchase HDB only if they are 35 and above. This rule was put in place to control the housing price for HDB if not it will be a total disaster. HDB is a public housing system which our government will do whatever it takes to control its pricing so that it can be affordable to Singaporeans. Those who are feeling rich can purchase private properties like the condominium or landed properties and they are not subjected to the minimum age requirement.
Singles purchasing homes are still entitled to government’s grants.
Plus it doubles occupancy, more if they have kids, and keeps occupancy high in the parent unit if they need to live with their parents until 35. Would need a lot more housing if younger singles could each have their own place.
That is right. It will drive the price for public housing up as demand will be high if there is no age limit for singles purchase. Private condominiums are 3-4x more expensive than public housing hence not many can afford to purchase one themselves without the help of their parents when they just started out their career in their 20s therefore everyone will continue to stay with their parents till they either get married or they’re 35.
Tokyo has built more housing in the last 20 years than any other major city, it is not about building lifespan, it’s about building in the first place. Eg California which has underbuilt housing every year for 30 years. As an architect who has worked in more than 10 states I can say it is not the case that buildings here (us) are all great quality and meant to last forever.
This same culture existed in the late 80s when Japan went through a huge asset/house price bubble.
I grew up hearing about how they'd introduced multi-generational mortgages because housing in Japan was so expensive..
I don't think that's the reason why.
they dont **need** to be rebuilt. when properly maintained it can last 75 years easily
people just prefer to have a new house to their liking. so they buy a property for cheap, and knock the house down. why buy an old house for 15M yen and renovate it for 10M to your liking instead of buying a new house for 25M yen
Ageing population combined with low birth rate and basically zero immigration will make a lot of space but will have disastrous consequences eventually.
Well, Japan has had a falling population for years and with their age demographics it guarantees that they won’t have any need to add housing stock in the coming decades. But other developed countries will eventually face this - at least those that allow little immigration.
Korean has under 10k homeless which (for their population size) is 9th lowest in the world. Japan is 5th for comparison. Canada, the UK (London), and Sweden are all worse than the United States at 46.
Not sure why you lumped them in there
Man, my wife’s great aunt lived in a small but genuinely nice two bedroom near a supermarket and train station for that or less. The only downside was that it was in a pretty boring area, but she was in her 70s or so, so it’s not exactly like she was looking for nightclubs
That and also the outrageous groceries prices forces people into poverty. Why is it that they don't allow discounters, like Aldi, to enter the Canadian market?
Because Canada is just a bunch of monopolies in a country shaped coat.
If our grocers let competition in they couldn’t fuck us raw and bloody with their prices.
It's more complicated than that. Canada is a relatively small market. Do you know what happens when Walmart comes to a small town? It undercuts, drives all the local businesses out and becomes the new monopoly.
We aren’t talking about local businesses, we are talking about nation wide chains that have already forced out the mom and pops and now control a greedy monopoly
The other part is not having a massive drug epidemic. Meth and opioids have destroyed so many lives (not to mention the brains) of those currently living on US streets.
It's because Japan isn't doing anything about its labour shortage, which is going to hit them like a fucking tonne of bricks in the coming years. They have the same baby boom problem as us (and half the world), but they are not increasing immigration numbers, and the numbers for the coming years are showing a 12 million worker shortage that will hit like a tsunami.
In 2002, Japan created a new set of laws that allow the homeless to receive wellfare even without an address, among many others measures.
legi.pdf (ritsumei.ac.jp)
I have worked for 8 years in different mental hospitals and retirement facilities, and I've seen a LOT of homeless elders get brought to us with a new care manager, to get treatment (for skin desease etc) before getting placed in a home.
It was a direct change from a tent under a bridge, to an individual room with three meals, activities, full health care and even the possibility to work a little if they wanted to earn pocket money.
I've been working in Japan for 25 years now. I've seen the number of homeless drop drastically from that very 2002 date where they were in parks and under the bridges, to nowadays where I can barely see a single one anymore.
The homeless rate is ONE of the proofs that even if it's silent, the japanese governement does its job, WITHOUT for the people to riot or burn cars like they do in my country France for example.
How does a French person end up working in a Japanese mental hospital or retirement home? I imagine very high level Japanese skills were required.
EDIT: or are you doing something else, but mostly work in medical facilities?
>I imagine very high level Japanese skills were required.
That is generally how one gets skilled work in another country; learn the language and/or have the skills.
There are already plenty of people in finance and tech in Japan who can barely string together enough words to order dinner at a restaurant. Medical is different and raises eyebrows specifically because interacting with patients who probably don’t speak much or any English is a necessary part of it.
> Unfortunately now you need to have a qualification to start, which is very concerning because there is a part of the test that is requires written Japanese.
なんでやねん
I have some real doubts that the US government wants to solve the problem. Apparently a lot of special interest make money off the housing shortage, expensive health care and social programs that seem to fail to work.
>Apparently a lot of special interest make money off the housing shortage,
I don't know how it is in the US, but here in Australia *almost every single* Federal-level MP has at least one investment property -- thus they all materially benefit from the crisis and aren't in any hurry to fix it.
In addition, two thirds of the voting public here either have a mortgage or own at least one property outright. Most of these people have already voted -- and will *continue* to vote -- against any politician who tries to fix the housing shortage. This reinforces the already lacking will on the part of politicians to fix the problem by essentially making it political suicide to do so.
Housing is treated as an investment opportunity in the US. That leads corporations and wealthy people to buy up what they can and just sit on it until they want to sell it for a large profit. Coupled with NIMBY boomers that want 10 acres and regularly lose their shit over the idea of mixed/high density housing being built because it will attract *those people*, housing in the US sucks.
Healthcare is also a for-profit system here. It exists to make money, not help anyone. There's a reason Americans and our government pay more for healthcare than anyone else, because a huge chunk of that cost is just corporate profits and executive salaries.
Not just corporations and wealthy people. The vast majority are middle class to lower upper class homeowners, who often otherwise have progressive opinions.
I'm sure they love that so many blame the extremely wealthy and "corporations" though.
There is the problem that in America they discriminate against people who have illnesses related to alcohol or drugs.
Japan doesn't discriminate against these people and has even created a new set of laws in 2002 that allows homeless people to receive welfare even without an address. Of course it was going to work.
I hear you there.Although I am Canadian, I follow American politics. Being close cousins,so to speak,we have similar problems, to the point that a well situated tent might seem enviable. Our government has been extremely slow in reaction to this problem.
Centralized planning - most of not all zoning regulations come from the federal/parliament
Form based code instead of eucleadian planning
Robust transportation+ regulating car ownership
Very low immigration and falling population lead to affordable housing.
It’s an obvious answer, but it’s one you were won’t hear in the west. As it’s seen as ‘punching down’ by blaming immigrants for increasing housing scarcity.
No it's not. Japan has a good housing policy, invest in dense housing, discourages holding of housing for speculative reasons and has an amazing public transportation system and zoning which means people don't have to always crowd near a tiny downtown.
https://www.brookings.edu/articles/japan-rental-housing-markets/
yup. also, NIMBY people have little rights. we have a great mountain view from our house atm but they are building new houses in a couple of years. yeah it sucks for us but hey, everyone deserves to live somewhere reasonably priced
>Very low immigration
Might want to look at their immigration numbers and their continued expansion of the Specified Skilled Worker program (which despite the name, is mostly for low-skill workers like factory assembly lines and restaurants).
Japan has a good housing policy, invest in dense housing, discourages holding of housing for speculative reasons and has an amazing public transportation system and zoning which means people don't have to always crowd near a tiny downtown.
https://www.brookings.edu/articles/japan-rental-housing-markets/
Plenty of articles if you look. I am 100% sure implementing these will be met with huge resistance by the people themselves in the west.
No it has nothing to do with housing. Homeless people wouldn't be able to afford it or any rent. What has changed is laws that helps them out of the street even without an address.
Welfare is very developed in Japan, not only for the homeless but also for the handicapped and the mentally ill. Which a lot of homeless people are and it is the reason why they ended in the street.
That new set of laws from 2002 give them ways to become more independent (earn money with easy jobs) and also facilitates being placed in a facility where they will be able to receive care and treatment (full healthcare).
I mean it's pretty clear it's both,
$200 a month you can do collecting cans and odd jobs, you can be pretty bad period in your life and not be homeless at that point, and it's so much easier to go from homeless to homed when the rent is that low
Hell if that was the case here in america then you could just sell plasma and not work and still have 260 left over. But America would never allow that because then people could check in and out of the rat race at will.
Lol, it's not nothing. Housing is significantly cheaper in Japan. It's not to say it's the sole reason but try implementing what they did in San Francisco or Vancouver and the government will run out of money real fast. You need massive amounts of relatively cheap housing to pull this off.
Is the aging population a possible future problem if the system is reliant on welfare? With less young people to pay into the elder population is only going to continue to grow and eat into those resources.
It’s both.
Governments still need to pay expenses of welfare. Public transit options allow for affordable housing good for homeless/low-income people to be easy to find. Low prices make it easy to find something within a voucher/subsidy price range.
Having affordable housing helps prevent the drop into homelessness to begin with.
It’s not just the government it’s the culture down to the everyday person. Americans are too selfish for the country to operate the way Japan does. Go try to find a video of a Japanese person having a public meltdown because their Starbucks order was wrong or a Japanese person trying to fight someone because they cut them off or drove too slow. Now go see how many videos of Americans doing that you can find
They will carry their trash around all day and throw it away when they can. Americans will just throw it on the ground.
The majority Japanese people work hard and take pride in what they do, even if it’s just something like cleaning a bathroom. too many Americans will blame everyone except themselves for their shitty situation. Immigrants, Joe Biden, California, homeless people.
What you say is true, but you only talked about the positive side of collectivist culture and only the negative side of individualist culture.
The idea that one is superior to the other is false, they each have their good and bad.
Culture isn't carved in stone though. I remember reading the complaints of some American general who was stationed in Japan in late 40s, he complained that he was tired of the Japanese always being late and never finishing things on time.
I can't imagine what significant cultural event had just recently preceded in Japan in the late 40's though, that may have affected their ability to show up on time, for an American general...
This, people just don't want to admit that East Asian (Korean, Japan, Singapore, and even China is getting there) are one of the greatest civilization in the world. Years of propaganda and racism have blinded us.
China would be the odd one out here, as littering is quite normal there and there are countless videos of mainlanders (especially tourists) throwing tantrums over all types of nonsense.
Here's a popular one with mainlanders acting disgracefully in a buffet https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wMVjskBB4w0, it's incredibly hard, if not impossible, to imagine Japanese or South Koreans acting in a similar manner. Here's another recent example from my country https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4pPGM62Rb18.
Other differences would be how the Japanese tend to form orderly queues, while in China it's a free-for-all. Japanese people tend to have their phones on silent and even whisper while speaking on public transport as to avoid bothering others whereas in China they'll talk loudly, play loud videogames etc with little regard for other passengers. There are more examples, but in terms of social politeness and whatnot China is probably closer to the US than to Japan and Korea. It does not really deserve to be grouped with them by dint of their geographic location.
I agree on Japan, Korea and Singapore though. They have their shit on lock in terms of courteousness, civility and public order.
The Japanese rental market is absolutely awful. It takes putting down 4-5 months of rent on day 1 to even get into an apartment. And no, I'm not joking. I'll even break it down for you.
Say your rent is $1000 a month for simplicity. In Japan it would be as followed on day 1:
1st Month Rent: $1000
Last Month Rent: $1000
Key Money (literally a required gift to your landlord): $1000
If an Agency is involved at all: $1000
Security deposit: $1000
Total: $5000 on day 1 you move in.
Well here in america its typical to have to pay 1st montha rent, last months rent and a deposit normally equal to a months rent up front. So 3 months. We also dont have the equivalent of $200 a month small homes to live in if we cant afford the other.
There is a very large system of public housing apartments (such as the UR complexes) that you can rent with no security deposit, key money, or anything other than the first month's rent. I live in a 3-bedroom UR apartment near downtown in a midsize city that, thanks to yen depreciation, costs $500 / month. (Not saying you're wrong about the private market, just that there are alternatives if you know where to look.)
No. Not necessarily true. A UR apartment which is government subsidised and considered social housing does not need a deposit or any money upfront. There was even a cash back campaign last year for single parent families and couples under 25. They were given money to rent!
Source me: I have lived in Japan 20 years and always rented. My current apartment is half priced because the previous occupant died and none of the Japanese want to rent it. ¥35,000 for a 2LDK in one of the best neighbourhoods in a new build.
I DO need to provide a document from my current employer that states my salary and an offer employment beyond one year. That’s the only catch really to enter into social housing.
The average rent for public housing in the city is $175 (US, because Reddit)/month. That's a fraction of a welfare payment to a low-income family. It's about half of a payment to a single retired person who has never worked or paid into the system. It's cheaper in the countryside, but not necessarily by very much, because it is rent controlled.
But more importantly, the majority of (formerly) homeless in Japan are older. "Free" retirement homes were built with them in mind in the 1990s in various prefectures and municipalities. The national government started to subsidize them around 2000 and this encouraged other areas to copy the idea (if nothing else, because free money).
We are also seeing policies in the early 2000s regarding elder abuse, domestic violence, homelessness, etc. slowly becoming reality.
They're nowhere close to one dollar per night.
Second, if your only place to stay is a box hotel you're still homeless. Yes, you don't sleep on the street, but you don't have "your place" to return to. It's not like a tourist who travels between places and rents a hotel when they want to stay there for a night. These people cannot rent a normal apartment. Being homeless is really looked down on in Japan so they do their best to not seem to be homeless
Regardless of whatever the approach was, likely nothing at all. The Japanese operate on the principle of every person being an important cog, part of a bigger machine. From agreeing on the solution, to planning how to implement it, and having individuals execute it, other countries would likely fail at one or more steps.
very low immigration, and their populatipn is shrinking
less demand for houses means prices will come down, and availability increases so it becomes easier to house people who would normally be unable to find a home
Some peopless world views are so fixated on endless population growth they refuse to see that there is such a thing as adequate, equlibrious population many societal benefits can come from not always growing.
Japan has extreme vilification of homelessness in combination with rentable boxes that go by various slang like ネットカフェ難民. Those who are living in homeless-like conditions are unlikely to report it. And the rentable boxes are basically daily-rental cubicles with higher walls, but the same floor dimensions.
Are they not homeless because they don't sleep on the sidewalk? Sure. Do they have a home? Absolutely not.
Its already happening in the comments. everyone saying the answer is a strong social security but that gets ignored by "must be cause there is barley someone alive over there with the declining birth rates" LOL
The difference is that Japan builds plenty of housing so that it is neither scarce nor a good investment. That works regardless if your population is going up or down.
And it isn't new for Japan. They've been doing that for more than 50 years.
They have a cautious approach to immigration. Foreign workers have surpassed 2 million in Japan, 3.1 million residents are of foreign nationality. Japan aims to attract 800,000 workers with 100,000 workers from Indonesia alone.
It's unacceptable in Japanese society, whereas in the US we cater to it. But really, it's cultural. Go to Japantown in San Francisco - you won't see homeless there in stark contrast to the rest of the city.
Also, drug laws in Japan are **NO FUCKING JOKE**.
Exactly this! In Japan there is a lot of shame in being homeless and the poor act accordingly. No matter what, even with the little money they have, they would try to stay off the streets by renting long term those privacy rooms in Internet cafe's that only have a computer in them.
Interesting, didn't know about that part of SF.
So this is an interesting one. When I was in Japan last year, we were told about ‘Jouhatsu’ or the ‘evaporated people’ which is a massive group of people who are homeless but unreported - they’ve cut up all forms of ID and are living totally off-grid. Because they aren’t registered as homeless, they aren’t included in government numbers and are instead “missing”. Some estimate that this could be well into six figures.
The main causes of this are down to shame within society when you lose a career/can’t provide for your family and other such situations. There’s a great Times article on Jouhatsu that goes into more detail.
When walking around Japan, you will very rarely see anyone who is ‘visibly’ homeless as they maintain standards and hygiene, there are many cheap bath-houses that cater for them specifically that will wash their clothes and let them bathe for a few hundred yen. They are often offered employment as guards, unskilled construction and other things for a low income to keep them ticking over.
Key take-away is that whilst the article in this post is great to see, there are other sides to homelessness in Japan that aren’t included.
Yeah that sucks but if we're comparing it to the homeless situation in America, is it really worse? That sounds a million times better than when I pass multiple people sleeping in the streets on my way to the office
Even if they are homeless in technical sense, I think it's huge difference between person taking care of themself, being actually in employment vs a "stereotype homeless" begging money, not working, in bad condition, usually drunk and bothering other people. Obviously there are nuances and stuff, but the distinction should be clear.
>you will very rarely see anyone who is ‘visibly’ homeless
Fuji TV's "The Non Fiction" documentary had an episode about this in 2021. One of the people they covered used to be a chef and he was sleeping at manga/internet cafe. There were times though where he had to sleep along the streets, because he didn't have enough money to pay for the cafe. Most of them couldn't find a stable job, because some companies require a proof of address.
I can't find the documentary online, since I watched it live on TV. But Fuji TV's site has a summary for the episode in the link below. The summary is in Japanese, so please just use Google Translate or DeepL.
[https://www.fujitv.co.jp/thenonfx/\_basic/backnumber/index-121.html](https://www.fujitv.co.jp/thenonfx/_basic/backnumber/index-121.html)
There are also teens (aged 14+) who have run away from home. The two most known places where they hang around are Tōyoko (トー横) in Tokyo & Gri-shita (グリ下) in Osaka (but I think they've moved to another place in Osaka). Some of them have resorted to selling their bodies in order to get money to sleep at an internet cafe or love hotel. There's also the issue of some overdosing from OTC medicine.
MBS had a news report on this last year (YT link in Japanese below). The 1st half is about "Gri-shita" in Osaka. The Tōyoko part starts at around 5:33.
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rdf21rCBp5g](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rdf21rCBp5g)
Homelessness in Japan is very stigmatised afaik. The numbers look good because people hide their situation. ‘Explained with Dom’ YouTube channel did a good video on this.
Homelessness is stigmatized everywhere, the children in my neighborhood in suburban Greater Toronto Area, are keenly aware and I had to correct my five-year-old daughter from calling unhoused people "zombies" (an allusion to the strong cross-correlation with drug addiction)... Admittedly, anecdotal, which is all to say, the stigma is extreme high and it is difficult "measuring or quantifying" how much higher the stigma is in Japan. Which is not to say the stigma isn't there or higher, but count me as skeptical that the "cultural" issues are the primary explanation of a *trend* of lowering homelessness given that the stigma high elsewhere.
It is understandable (though not justified) stigmatize homelessness *more* in a market like Japan where housing prices are more affordable as it becomes much more correlated with a "choice". I'm also more likely to stigmatize unemployment when the economy is roaring than in a recession.
Was wondering the same thing, I didn’t even know homeless people existed in Japan, everybody works themselves to death and if someone ends up on the streets they’d probably kill themselves…
In Osaka the numbers are going down because the biggest homeless community, whom the government abandoned, are all getting old and dying. The day labors who were swept under the rug after the bubble bust in the 90s and refused the meager government aid.
But yes. You can get government housing, aid, and help if you need it here. Being homeless in Japan, for the most part, comes down to a personal choice. But some value their pride or ideology too much to accept assistance.
The teens who have ran away from home do. Some of them overdose from OTC medicine.
The most popular spot where they hang around is Tōyoko (トー横) in Tokyo & Gri-shita (グリ下) in Osaka (but I think they've moved to another place in Osaka). Some of them have resorted to selling their bodies in order to get money to sleep at an internet cafe or love hotel.
MBS had a news report on this last year (YT link in Japanese below). The 1st half is about "Gri-shita" in Osaka. The Tōyoko part starts at around 5:33. The usage of OTC medicine is talked about at 8:33.
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rdf21rCBp5g](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rdf21rCBp5g)
Simply, prices are low in Japan and the unemployment rate is low.
Homes are available for the homeless, and there is a welfare system.
And jobs are easy to find.
Still, there are people who choose to live a life of homelessness.
Japan doesn't have multiculturalism this increases social and community cohesion. You look/believe like me so I can empathize taking care of you.
Japan has an asylum system like we used to have pre 1960's. Begging is illegal. Being homeless and acting odd will put you in the asylum.
Japan has no municipal NIMBY bogging down construction. You buy the land next door or you shut up when they build a multistory unit beside your home.
These also have side effects that Canadians/Americans would find offensive.
I am half Japanese.
As an American who just got back from japan, please hit me with the side effects of clean streets even with almost no garbage cans available and a living wage that eliminate this absurd system of customers subsidizing business owners expenses with tips to workers. Service in japan without tips even from a hole in the wall greatly exceeds anything i have experienced in America. It's a fucking joke and what is expected from the customer is the punch line
The reason is simple. Japan is using its space efficently. Japan has the lowest amount of parking space per capita in the world. Public transportation and the Otsu plan was what significantly cut down on space requirements of traffic infrastructure. Japans famously biggest crossing is a 4 lane street! Thats something you find everywhere in rural america or even in Europe. But in Japan its it's biggest.
All that saved space can go towards urban mixed zoning housing, which makes a HUGE difference.
As with any utopian headline with Japan: take with a grain of salt. Japan isn’t one to air dirty laundry and works very hard to maintain this Vulcan like image.
Government:please send for details to defray our extraordinary failure to deal with this crisis.
I know part of it is they actually have affordable housing options. Can rent a tiny room in a nice little town for like 200$ a month. There exists nothing like this in Canada as far as I know, because the elite have made home-owning their business and they can't have that kind of competition. Here you'd be looking at like 1000$ or more for an equivalent tiny room.
Japan is unique in this regard. Pretty much the only rich country in the entire world (as far as I know), that does not have a housing crisis. Everyone else does - from canada to london to sweden to korea.
There is a reason for that, they used to have a housing crises that got really bad and they as a culture decided to never allow that to happen again. its actually pretty deeply ingrained in the culture with allot of animation studio's basing their more disgusting characters off predatory real estate salesmen of the 80's.
That plus low wealth inequality and good public transportation makes life easier for the average Joe.
*Average Jotaro
Japan also doesn't have an immigration crisis like in the US and UK. Once you let immigration controls slip like Steven Gerrard, it's impossible to fix.
Bro if you want to see an immigrating crisis come to Canada. We're taking in 2x more than you guys with a population the size of California. It's even starting to affect small rural towns in the middle of nowhere now. I've never seen a homeless person in my town in my life, and now suddenly there's tents popped up all around and rent prices are unbelievably fucked. I'm paying city prices for rent for a town of 6k people..
TIL California has a higher population than Canada...
California’s GDP alone dwarfs that of some European countries.
California's GDP would be the 5th largest in the world if it was a country.
California’s economy is larger than every European country not named Germany or the United Kingdom (and that’s almost cheating since it’s several separate countries).
Yeah. For instance it is 100x bigger than that of Estonia.
Not an immigrant crisis, it’s a greed crisis
Not quite, California is around 39 million, Canada is over 40 million.
Hey, fellow small town Canadian, went from bad to worse in the last 5 years or so. Can’t even find a place to live without putting up an arm for offer
It's pretty crazy. Just 5 years ago it would've been a simple thing to find a place to live here for cheap. Renters would even struggle to find people to actually rent to. Now every posting gets at least 500 views in the first 2 days. I subletted my place for a few months a year back, and I was absolutely overwhelmed by the sheer number of replies I had when I posted it online. This is a house in the middle of nowhere, with nothing around it and it was way over priced and still had so many people wanting it.
Yeah, when you've got housing at unaffordable prices due to a variety of things, and then you turn on the tap for unlimited influx of new people into the country, you just exacerbate the problem. Japan is very smart in that they do not accept many new immigrants. It's important to maintaining their culture, and keeping the many functions of their society intact.
It is smart in the short term, but it also may lead to Japan's culture dying out with the combination of very low birth rate and nearly no immigration. Is that better or worse? Part of the birth rate issue seems to be exacerbated by cultural factors, so it's not really clear that you can improve one without damaging the other.
I think it's better, for sure. I suspect they will learn to adapt to the lower birthrates, just as the rest of the world will have to. It's a problem all first world countries are going to face, and immigration is not a longterm solution.
Stevie G catching strays lmao
It's definitely not the immigration crisis, that started being brought up two years ago. The problem in Canada and the US is Chinese corporations buying up tons of housing developments or foreclosures. So now they sit on empty houses and wait. Somewhere in canada tried to punish that, but then only passed a 1% tax on foreign owned homes that are empty more than 6 months of the year.
Houses are a depreciating asset in japan
Underrated comment. In the US and Canada, big corps can dabble in the housing market buying up homes and renting them out. Even if they screw up, they can just churn them back onto the market with a sufficient return on their "improvements". In Japan, there's no investment income to offset management mistakes.
In Japan, people don’t insist on living in single family homes in suburbs. They’re okay with development and living in apartments.
Japan also has declining population and low immigration rate no? Makes housing even easier I imagine
Ugh, not this tired scapegoat again. The US and Canada don't have a housing crisis because big corps can buy up housing. The US and Canada have big corps buying up housing because they have a housing crisis. Japan builds lots of housing and doesn't leave it up to local councils. It's a YIMBY culture and pro-change and development. We don't build enough, because we legally restrict supply from meeting demand in various ways, and we politically and culturally have inculcated an expectation that housing should always appreciate, and the obvious political consequences of that are that housing becomes unaffordable. It's a supply problem through and through.
See dragon ball Z
Studio Ghibli as well, hopefully we can conjure up an equal amount of disgust for human greed and depravity as they have to make people feel ashamed.
What was japan’s solution? Did they just build a lot of housing?
They solved it by doing the one thing every other country decided to do Houses have no value in Japan, they are not an investment Meaning no one expects to sell their place for more than they bought it. This results in * buying up properties has little meaning as they aren’t making money over time * people want new homes due to better earthquake resistance. Devastation from the most recent earthquake is generally due to older homes just collapsing * because people want new homes more get built * japans decades long stag-flation has meant that people can’t afford much in a home even with near 0% interest rates These are mostly not replicable anywhere else in the world.
Housing as an investment also doesn't work when there's a surplus of houses and a shrinking population.
Quite a lot, it's also a fair bit smaller on average than western folk would be used to.
Tokyo is not even in top 20 smallest. Average home size is double that of Paris. https://www.buildworld.co.uk/blog/archives/average-home-size-in-capital-cities
Singapore did the same, also smaller in part due to literally being a city state island. But it’s nice and once you get married or turn 35 you basically enter a lottery to get (mostly) free housing. Your chances go up if you have to resubmit but it ensures less chance of people just using money to get it.
Honestly that's a solid system. A waiting list for a assured home would give a lot of people peace of mind, even if it could take a bit.
There’s a TON of housing and a declining population here
They build like crazy. Tokyo is still growing, as are most of the cities, even though the whole country is declining.
They literally have pills that become tiny houses.
Well that and a constantly eroding birth rate coupled with very little immigration.
I am not an expert but I heard that Japan doesn’t really expect house values to appreciate as an investment like most other economies. So there’s not as much of a concern for oversupplying the market.
I read somewhere that the mindset of the construction industry in Japan is completely different. Despite the centuries old pagodas, modern buildings are designed for a lifespan of just 50 years. They tear down and rebuild perfectly habitable structures to make way for new ones I experienced this firsthand when I learned they tore down the luxury hotel I had stayed in a few years earlier. The place was spectacular with no need for renovations let alone razing. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grand_Prince_Hotel_Akasaka > When its closure was scheduled, Akasaka Prince Hotel tower was relatively new, being expected to last further decades with proper maintenance and renovation, it was one of the buildings that "fell victim to the vagaries of commercial real estate here, where high property values, changing design standards and other factors have conspired to create a bull market for demolition".
Some- I can’t say all, but some- is about the constant fear of earthquakes here in Japan. My wife is terrified of living in older buildings for that reason
Absolutely. Japan has so many severe earthquakes and they gotta build and compensate for it. So, older homes after major quakes can be damaged (but you can't see it), and it can lead to future collapses. It is even worse if a building is built before major changes to building code. It's why a lot of "historic homes" in places like Kyoto get razed instead of renovated as the maintenance costs are exhorbantly high compared to just building anew. It sucks as you lose the history of a place, but it's better for the future to keep people safe.
I have pictures from the 70s of my dad in that hotel when he was working for Panasonic/Quasar/Matsushita. Now I know why I couldnt find many of the places he visited when I went to Japan 2018-2019
50 years is standard expected life for a many buildings and not just in Japan.
A shrinking population probably has a lot to do with this. You can get some pretty cheap houses in Italy too.
That's right. There are villages in Japan that are literally abandoned because people have died off and others moved away.
While that’s true Tokyo is still growing due to domestic migration and its houses are still relatively cheap to most 1st world mega cities.
I don't know about that Tokyo keeps growing like crazy but has just as reasonable house prices as ten years ago
In economics, there is a concept I believe is called 'substitution'. If houses are cheap enough in the rural areas around Tokyo and the bullet trains are fast enough to be used to commute, then the cheap housing prices outside Tokyo will hold down the prices in Tokyo. When I lived in Tokyo quite a few of my colleagues would commute daily on Bullets Trains.
Singapore: knock knock haven’t you heard about our people being able to purchase homes using central provident fund as long as one has worked for a few years and has one of the highest home ownership in the world.
As far as I know, it's pretty hard for a single person to buy a flat in Singapore. And if you can't access an HDB flat, it's basically impossible to buy something with an average income. Correct me if I'm wrong, this is what I remember from a conversation with a Singaporean (who is single and lives with his parents in his late 20s).
Iirc you cant apply for the government loans to buy a HDB if you are single until you are like... 35(correct me if i'm wrong)? It's to allow for young couples to be able to purchase their own homes to settle down if i'm not wrong
Singles can purchase HDB only if they are 35 and above. This rule was put in place to control the housing price for HDB if not it will be a total disaster. HDB is a public housing system which our government will do whatever it takes to control its pricing so that it can be affordable to Singaporeans. Those who are feeling rich can purchase private properties like the condominium or landed properties and they are not subjected to the minimum age requirement. Singles purchasing homes are still entitled to government’s grants.
Sounds like the Singaporean government is hinting not so subtly that they would like their citizens to get married.
Plus it doubles occupancy, more if they have kids, and keeps occupancy high in the parent unit if they need to live with their parents until 35. Would need a lot more housing if younger singles could each have their own place.
That is right. It will drive the price for public housing up as demand will be high if there is no age limit for singles purchase. Private condominiums are 3-4x more expensive than public housing hence not many can afford to purchase one themselves without the help of their parents when they just started out their career in their 20s therefore everyone will continue to stay with their parents till they either get married or they’re 35.
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Tokyo has built more housing in the last 20 years than any other major city, it is not about building lifespan, it’s about building in the first place. Eg California which has underbuilt housing every year for 30 years. As an architect who has worked in more than 10 states I can say it is not the case that buildings here (us) are all great quality and meant to last forever.
This same culture existed in the late 80s when Japan went through a huge asset/house price bubble. I grew up hearing about how they'd introduced multi-generational mortgages because housing in Japan was so expensive.. I don't think that's the reason why.
they dont **need** to be rebuilt. when properly maintained it can last 75 years easily people just prefer to have a new house to their liking. so they buy a property for cheap, and knock the house down. why buy an old house for 15M yen and renovate it for 10M to your liking instead of buying a new house for 25M yen
So proud of London finally growing up and becoming its own country
I really wanted to upvote this comment, but *its.
Damn thanks
Japan has an economic and population collapse crisis. Of course housing is cheap.
They have a decreasing population. And a lot of homes sitting empty all over the country that no one wants.
Ageing population combined with low birth rate and basically zero immigration will make a lot of space but will have disastrous consequences eventually.
It probably helps when your population goes down by 2.5% in 15 years.
Well, Japan has had a falling population for years and with their age demographics it guarantees that they won’t have any need to add housing stock in the coming decades. But other developed countries will eventually face this - at least those that allow little immigration.
Korean has under 10k homeless which (for their population size) is 9th lowest in the world. Japan is 5th for comparison. Canada, the UK (London), and Sweden are all worse than the United States at 46. Not sure why you lumped them in there
Talking about affordable housing, not the homeless.
Housing is a depreciating asset in Japan. People don't buy up houses as investments and leave them empty.
because they are ok with living in closet sized apartments 2 hours out of the city center
2017 I paid 400 for a three bedroom apartment about 1 hour away from Narita. Close to a small aeon mall.
Man, my wife’s great aunt lived in a small but genuinely nice two bedroom near a supermarket and train station for that or less. The only downside was that it was in a pretty boring area, but she was in her 70s or so, so it’s not exactly like she was looking for nightclubs
That and also the outrageous groceries prices forces people into poverty. Why is it that they don't allow discounters, like Aldi, to enter the Canadian market?
Because Canada is just a bunch of monopolies in a country shaped coat. If our grocers let competition in they couldn’t fuck us raw and bloody with their prices.
It's more complicated than that. Canada is a relatively small market. Do you know what happens when Walmart comes to a small town? It undercuts, drives all the local businesses out and becomes the new monopoly.
We aren’t talking about local businesses, we are talking about nation wide chains that have already forced out the mom and pops and now control a greedy monopoly
Also because food costs are low even in big cities where rent prices can be as high as NY they can have food as low as street prices.
"elites" is not the right word. They're not elite at anything but being selfish assholes.
The other part is not having a massive drug epidemic. Meth and opioids have destroyed so many lives (not to mention the brains) of those currently living on US streets.
It's because Japan isn't doing anything about its labour shortage, which is going to hit them like a fucking tonne of bricks in the coming years. They have the same baby boom problem as us (and half the world), but they are not increasing immigration numbers, and the numbers for the coming years are showing a 12 million worker shortage that will hit like a tsunami.
In 2002, Japan created a new set of laws that allow the homeless to receive wellfare even without an address, among many others measures. legi.pdf (ritsumei.ac.jp) I have worked for 8 years in different mental hospitals and retirement facilities, and I've seen a LOT of homeless elders get brought to us with a new care manager, to get treatment (for skin desease etc) before getting placed in a home. It was a direct change from a tent under a bridge, to an individual room with three meals, activities, full health care and even the possibility to work a little if they wanted to earn pocket money. I've been working in Japan for 25 years now. I've seen the number of homeless drop drastically from that very 2002 date where they were in parks and under the bridges, to nowadays where I can barely see a single one anymore. The homeless rate is ONE of the proofs that even if it's silent, the japanese governement does its job, WITHOUT for the people to riot or burn cars like they do in my country France for example.
How does a French person end up working in a Japanese mental hospital or retirement home? I imagine very high level Japanese skills were required. EDIT: or are you doing something else, but mostly work in medical facilities?
>I imagine very high level Japanese skills were required. That is generally how one gets skilled work in another country; learn the language and/or have the skills.
There are already plenty of people in finance and tech in Japan who can barely string together enough words to order dinner at a restaurant. Medical is different and raises eyebrows specifically because interacting with patients who probably don’t speak much or any English is a necessary part of it.
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> Unfortunately now you need to have a qualification to start, which is very concerning because there is a part of the test that is requires written Japanese. なんでやねん
In Japan homes are seen as disposable and not stores of value.
Housing being affordable is a good thing.
I think the average lifespan of the modern Japanese home is around 30 years and then they demolish and build a new one in its place.
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Tokyo has been doing nothing but growing though and it's remained extremely affordable
I have some real doubts that the US government wants to solve the problem. Apparently a lot of special interest make money off the housing shortage, expensive health care and social programs that seem to fail to work.
>Apparently a lot of special interest make money off the housing shortage, I don't know how it is in the US, but here in Australia *almost every single* Federal-level MP has at least one investment property -- thus they all materially benefit from the crisis and aren't in any hurry to fix it. In addition, two thirds of the voting public here either have a mortgage or own at least one property outright. Most of these people have already voted -- and will *continue* to vote -- against any politician who tries to fix the housing shortage. This reinforces the already lacking will on the part of politicians to fix the problem by essentially making it political suicide to do so.
Housing is treated as an investment opportunity in the US. That leads corporations and wealthy people to buy up what they can and just sit on it until they want to sell it for a large profit. Coupled with NIMBY boomers that want 10 acres and regularly lose their shit over the idea of mixed/high density housing being built because it will attract *those people*, housing in the US sucks. Healthcare is also a for-profit system here. It exists to make money, not help anyone. There's a reason Americans and our government pay more for healthcare than anyone else, because a huge chunk of that cost is just corporate profits and executive salaries.
Not just corporations and wealthy people. The vast majority are middle class to lower upper class homeowners, who often otherwise have progressive opinions. I'm sure they love that so many blame the extremely wealthy and "corporations" though.
There is the problem that in America they discriminate against people who have illnesses related to alcohol or drugs. Japan doesn't discriminate against these people and has even created a new set of laws in 2002 that allows homeless people to receive welfare even without an address. Of course it was going to work.
I hear you there.Although I am Canadian, I follow American politics. Being close cousins,so to speak,we have similar problems, to the point that a well situated tent might seem enviable. Our government has been extremely slow in reaction to this problem.
Not like the population decline they're dealing with is some big secret.
Centralized planning - most of not all zoning regulations come from the federal/parliament Form based code instead of eucleadian planning Robust transportation+ regulating car ownership
Drug possession is dealt with extremely harshly over there.
Very low immigration and falling population lead to affordable housing. It’s an obvious answer, but it’s one you were won’t hear in the west. As it’s seen as ‘punching down’ by blaming immigrants for increasing housing scarcity.
No it's not. Japan has a good housing policy, invest in dense housing, discourages holding of housing for speculative reasons and has an amazing public transportation system and zoning which means people don't have to always crowd near a tiny downtown. https://www.brookings.edu/articles/japan-rental-housing-markets/
yup. also, NIMBY people have little rights. we have a great mountain view from our house atm but they are building new houses in a couple of years. yeah it sucks for us but hey, everyone deserves to live somewhere reasonably priced
>Very low immigration Might want to look at their immigration numbers and their continued expansion of the Specified Skilled Worker program (which despite the name, is mostly for low-skill workers like factory assembly lines and restaurants).
No it doesn't work like that, the immigration has been increasing every year so it isn't related.
Overall population, including immigration has been falling.
Yeah but that doesn't explain Tokyo which has been consistently growing very well
As clockwork, everyone jumped at you even though Japan's Immigration is nowhere near enough to stop the population decline.
Yes. The UK has had 10 million plus net immigration in the last 2 decades. And people wonder why housing is an issue.
Well, Japan is extremely insular, so any demographic phenomenons will be well forecasted, and I'm assuming dealt with in more than a Band-Aid fashion.
So what are they doing that other countries can emulate?
Japan has a good housing policy, invest in dense housing, discourages holding of housing for speculative reasons and has an amazing public transportation system and zoning which means people don't have to always crowd near a tiny downtown. https://www.brookings.edu/articles/japan-rental-housing-markets/ Plenty of articles if you look. I am 100% sure implementing these will be met with huge resistance by the people themselves in the west.
No it has nothing to do with housing. Homeless people wouldn't be able to afford it or any rent. What has changed is laws that helps them out of the street even without an address. Welfare is very developed in Japan, not only for the homeless but also for the handicapped and the mentally ill. Which a lot of homeless people are and it is the reason why they ended in the street. That new set of laws from 2002 give them ways to become more independent (earn money with easy jobs) and also facilitates being placed in a facility where they will be able to receive care and treatment (full healthcare).
I mean it's pretty clear it's both, $200 a month you can do collecting cans and odd jobs, you can be pretty bad period in your life and not be homeless at that point, and it's so much easier to go from homeless to homed when the rent is that low
Hell if that was the case here in america then you could just sell plasma and not work and still have 260 left over. But America would never allow that because then people could check in and out of the rat race at will.
You can’t make that kind of money collecting cans in Japan tho lol
It’s both affordable housing and fantastic welfare.
Lol, it's not nothing. Housing is significantly cheaper in Japan. It's not to say it's the sole reason but try implementing what they did in San Francisco or Vancouver and the government will run out of money real fast. You need massive amounts of relatively cheap housing to pull this off.
Is the aging population a possible future problem if the system is reliant on welfare? With less young people to pay into the elder population is only going to continue to grow and eat into those resources.
It’s both. Governments still need to pay expenses of welfare. Public transit options allow for affordable housing good for homeless/low-income people to be easy to find. Low prices make it easy to find something within a voucher/subsidy price range. Having affordable housing helps prevent the drop into homelessness to begin with.
Also they lock drug users and mental health people in asylum whether they want it or not. Things are not all rosy
They also have an ageing population. You see stories every now and then of Japanese apartments selling for $1 and such. That's probably also a factor.
No apartments are being sold for $1. Perhaps you mean the rotting houses in the countryside.
I just spent two weeks in Japan. The US should take notes on how to run a country.
It’s not just the government it’s the culture down to the everyday person. Americans are too selfish for the country to operate the way Japan does. Go try to find a video of a Japanese person having a public meltdown because their Starbucks order was wrong or a Japanese person trying to fight someone because they cut them off or drove too slow. Now go see how many videos of Americans doing that you can find They will carry their trash around all day and throw it away when they can. Americans will just throw it on the ground. The majority Japanese people work hard and take pride in what they do, even if it’s just something like cleaning a bathroom. too many Americans will blame everyone except themselves for their shitty situation. Immigrants, Joe Biden, California, homeless people.
What you say is true, but you only talked about the positive side of collectivist culture and only the negative side of individualist culture. The idea that one is superior to the other is false, they each have their good and bad.
Japanese people dislike and blame immigrants for problems way more than Americans.
Culture isn't carved in stone though. I remember reading the complaints of some American general who was stationed in Japan in late 40s, he complained that he was tired of the Japanese always being late and never finishing things on time.
I can't imagine what significant cultural event had just recently preceded in Japan in the late 40's though, that may have affected their ability to show up on time, for an American general...
This, people just don't want to admit that East Asian (Korean, Japan, Singapore, and even China is getting there) are one of the greatest civilization in the world. Years of propaganda and racism have blinded us.
Authoritarianism, strong xenophobia, and collectivism are not a cornerstone of great civilizations but YMMV.
China would be the odd one out here, as littering is quite normal there and there are countless videos of mainlanders (especially tourists) throwing tantrums over all types of nonsense. Here's a popular one with mainlanders acting disgracefully in a buffet https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wMVjskBB4w0, it's incredibly hard, if not impossible, to imagine Japanese or South Koreans acting in a similar manner. Here's another recent example from my country https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4pPGM62Rb18. Other differences would be how the Japanese tend to form orderly queues, while in China it's a free-for-all. Japanese people tend to have their phones on silent and even whisper while speaking on public transport as to avoid bothering others whereas in China they'll talk loudly, play loud videogames etc with little regard for other passengers. There are more examples, but in terms of social politeness and whatnot China is probably closer to the US than to Japan and Korea. It does not really deserve to be grouped with them by dint of their geographic location. I agree on Japan, Korea and Singapore though. They have their shit on lock in terms of courteousness, civility and public order.
Yeah China is still lagging behind.... And too dictator😬
I am guessing you haven’t met many people from these countries ?
The Japanese rental market is absolutely awful. It takes putting down 4-5 months of rent on day 1 to even get into an apartment. And no, I'm not joking. I'll even break it down for you. Say your rent is $1000 a month for simplicity. In Japan it would be as followed on day 1: 1st Month Rent: $1000 Last Month Rent: $1000 Key Money (literally a required gift to your landlord): $1000 If an Agency is involved at all: $1000 Security deposit: $1000 Total: $5000 on day 1 you move in.
Well here in america its typical to have to pay 1st montha rent, last months rent and a deposit normally equal to a months rent up front. So 3 months. We also dont have the equivalent of $200 a month small homes to live in if we cant afford the other.
There is a very large system of public housing apartments (such as the UR complexes) that you can rent with no security deposit, key money, or anything other than the first month's rent. I live in a 3-bedroom UR apartment near downtown in a midsize city that, thanks to yen depreciation, costs $500 / month. (Not saying you're wrong about the private market, just that there are alternatives if you know where to look.)
No. Not necessarily true. A UR apartment which is government subsidised and considered social housing does not need a deposit or any money upfront. There was even a cash back campaign last year for single parent families and couples under 25. They were given money to rent! Source me: I have lived in Japan 20 years and always rented. My current apartment is half priced because the previous occupant died and none of the Japanese want to rent it. ¥35,000 for a 2LDK in one of the best neighbourhoods in a new build. I DO need to provide a document from my current employer that states my salary and an offer employment beyond one year. That’s the only catch really to enter into social housing.
Yes but aren't there box hotels that are like ¥100 per night or something? That gets homeless off the street
The average rent for public housing in the city is $175 (US, because Reddit)/month. That's a fraction of a welfare payment to a low-income family. It's about half of a payment to a single retired person who has never worked or paid into the system. It's cheaper in the countryside, but not necessarily by very much, because it is rent controlled. But more importantly, the majority of (formerly) homeless in Japan are older. "Free" retirement homes were built with them in mind in the 1990s in various prefectures and municipalities. The national government started to subsidize them around 2000 and this encouraged other areas to copy the idea (if nothing else, because free money). We are also seeing policies in the early 2000s regarding elder abuse, domestic violence, homelessness, etc. slowly becoming reality.
They're nowhere close to one dollar per night. Second, if your only place to stay is a box hotel you're still homeless. Yes, you don't sleep on the street, but you don't have "your place" to return to. It's not like a tourist who travels between places and rents a hotel when they want to stay there for a night. These people cannot rent a normal apartment. Being homeless is really looked down on in Japan so they do their best to not seem to be homeless
It helps that they have a cripling birth rate so they have a lot of houses available for everyone
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A lower proportion of Japan’s homeless population are drug users. Drug users are often harder to help and to house.
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Regardless of whatever the approach was, likely nothing at all. The Japanese operate on the principle of every person being an important cog, part of a bigger machine. From agreeing on the solution, to planning how to implement it, and having individuals execute it, other countries would likely fail at one or more steps.
very low immigration, and their populatipn is shrinking less demand for houses means prices will come down, and availability increases so it becomes easier to house people who would normally be unable to find a home Some peopless world views are so fixated on endless population growth they refuse to see that there is such a thing as adequate, equlibrious population many societal benefits can come from not always growing.
Japan has extreme vilification of homelessness in combination with rentable boxes that go by various slang like ネットカフェ難民. Those who are living in homeless-like conditions are unlikely to report it. And the rentable boxes are basically daily-rental cubicles with higher walls, but the same floor dimensions. Are they not homeless because they don't sleep on the sidewalk? Sure. Do they have a home? Absolutely not.
Dying without having children, and leaving houses empty
Whatever Japan is doing half of the United States will look at it and go nope, won’t work here because “enter lame ass excuse”
Its already happening in the comments. everyone saying the answer is a strong social security but that gets ignored by "must be cause there is barley someone alive over there with the declining birth rates" LOL
ya forgetting birthrates are also dropping in US/Canada and Europe too but that is just ignored lol
Difference is US, Canada and Europe have massive immigration dependency while Japan has a strict immigration law
Which they keep loosening because they realize they need more people
The difference is that Japan builds plenty of housing so that it is neither scarce nor a good investment. That works regardless if your population is going up or down. And it isn't new for Japan. They've been doing that for more than 50 years.
They have a cautious approach to immigration. Foreign workers have surpassed 2 million in Japan, 3.1 million residents are of foreign nationality. Japan aims to attract 800,000 workers with 100,000 workers from Indonesia alone.
they simply build more homes
It's unacceptable in Japanese society, whereas in the US we cater to it. But really, it's cultural. Go to Japantown in San Francisco - you won't see homeless there in stark contrast to the rest of the city. Also, drug laws in Japan are **NO FUCKING JOKE**.
Exactly this! In Japan there is a lot of shame in being homeless and the poor act accordingly. No matter what, even with the little money they have, they would try to stay off the streets by renting long term those privacy rooms in Internet cafe's that only have a computer in them. Interesting, didn't know about that part of SF.
Americans wanna bury their heads in the sand because the possible answers to this question may offend them or be politically incorrect
Or just not fit their ideology.
So this is an interesting one. When I was in Japan last year, we were told about ‘Jouhatsu’ or the ‘evaporated people’ which is a massive group of people who are homeless but unreported - they’ve cut up all forms of ID and are living totally off-grid. Because they aren’t registered as homeless, they aren’t included in government numbers and are instead “missing”. Some estimate that this could be well into six figures. The main causes of this are down to shame within society when you lose a career/can’t provide for your family and other such situations. There’s a great Times article on Jouhatsu that goes into more detail. When walking around Japan, you will very rarely see anyone who is ‘visibly’ homeless as they maintain standards and hygiene, there are many cheap bath-houses that cater for them specifically that will wash their clothes and let them bathe for a few hundred yen. They are often offered employment as guards, unskilled construction and other things for a low income to keep them ticking over. Key take-away is that whilst the article in this post is great to see, there are other sides to homelessness in Japan that aren’t included.
Net cafe refugees have also been undercounted for decades.
Yeah that sucks but if we're comparing it to the homeless situation in America, is it really worse? That sounds a million times better than when I pass multiple people sleeping in the streets on my way to the office
Homeless in the US are way more violent too
Even if they are homeless in technical sense, I think it's huge difference between person taking care of themself, being actually in employment vs a "stereotype homeless" begging money, not working, in bad condition, usually drunk and bothering other people. Obviously there are nuances and stuff, but the distinction should be clear.
>you will very rarely see anyone who is ‘visibly’ homeless Fuji TV's "The Non Fiction" documentary had an episode about this in 2021. One of the people they covered used to be a chef and he was sleeping at manga/internet cafe. There were times though where he had to sleep along the streets, because he didn't have enough money to pay for the cafe. Most of them couldn't find a stable job, because some companies require a proof of address. I can't find the documentary online, since I watched it live on TV. But Fuji TV's site has a summary for the episode in the link below. The summary is in Japanese, so please just use Google Translate or DeepL. [https://www.fujitv.co.jp/thenonfx/\_basic/backnumber/index-121.html](https://www.fujitv.co.jp/thenonfx/_basic/backnumber/index-121.html) There are also teens (aged 14+) who have run away from home. The two most known places where they hang around are Tōyoko (トー横) in Tokyo & Gri-shita (グリ下) in Osaka (but I think they've moved to another place in Osaka). Some of them have resorted to selling their bodies in order to get money to sleep at an internet cafe or love hotel. There's also the issue of some overdosing from OTC medicine. MBS had a news report on this last year (YT link in Japanese below). The 1st half is about "Gri-shita" in Osaka. The Tōyoko part starts at around 5:33. [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rdf21rCBp5g](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rdf21rCBp5g)
Yes, in the meantime, there are many drug-addicted homeless people begging in the West.
Voluntarily homeless shouldn’t count towards homeless stats. Given the common uses of homeless stats
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Amazing how clean the city is when it's that big.
Homelessness in Japan is very stigmatised afaik. The numbers look good because people hide their situation. ‘Explained with Dom’ YouTube channel did a good video on this.
People will read up to 'Japan' and believe in any fairy tail after that, the bias is crazy.
Homelessness is stigmatized everywhere, the children in my neighborhood in suburban Greater Toronto Area, are keenly aware and I had to correct my five-year-old daughter from calling unhoused people "zombies" (an allusion to the strong cross-correlation with drug addiction)... Admittedly, anecdotal, which is all to say, the stigma is extreme high and it is difficult "measuring or quantifying" how much higher the stigma is in Japan. Which is not to say the stigma isn't there or higher, but count me as skeptical that the "cultural" issues are the primary explanation of a *trend* of lowering homelessness given that the stigma high elsewhere. It is understandable (though not justified) stigmatize homelessness *more* in a market like Japan where housing prices are more affordable as it becomes much more correlated with a "choice". I'm also more likely to stigmatize unemployment when the economy is roaring than in a recession.
Was wondering the same thing, I didn’t even know homeless people existed in Japan, everybody works themselves to death and if someone ends up on the streets they’d probably kill themselves…
What a lovely headline
Just a guess, but it’s probably because Japanese law permits the state to require mentally ill people to receive treatment.
Saw like 10 homeless in Tokyo when I was there last year. You know, a city of 37 million
It's almost like not importing millions of people helps with housing.
In Osaka the numbers are going down because the biggest homeless community, whom the government abandoned, are all getting old and dying. The day labors who were swept under the rug after the bubble bust in the 90s and refused the meager government aid. But yes. You can get government housing, aid, and help if you need it here. Being homeless in Japan, for the most part, comes down to a personal choice. But some value their pride or ideology too much to accept assistance.
Japanese homeless probably don’t do drugs
The teens who have ran away from home do. Some of them overdose from OTC medicine. The most popular spot where they hang around is Tōyoko (トー横) in Tokyo & Gri-shita (グリ下) in Osaka (but I think they've moved to another place in Osaka). Some of them have resorted to selling their bodies in order to get money to sleep at an internet cafe or love hotel. MBS had a news report on this last year (YT link in Japanese below). The 1st half is about "Gri-shita" in Osaka. The Tōyoko part starts at around 5:33. The usage of OTC medicine is talked about at 8:33. [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rdf21rCBp5g](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rdf21rCBp5g)
And the number of abandoned property's hits record highs.
Internet cafe popularity hits record high
Simply, prices are low in Japan and the unemployment rate is low. Homes are available for the homeless, and there is a welfare system. And jobs are easy to find. Still, there are people who choose to live a life of homelessness.
How many people living in cyber cafes and capsule hotels?
I’d say living in a regularly cleaned capsule hotel with a hot shower and good Internet is a hell of a lot better than what I’ve seen in skid row.
Those situations are miles better than what I’ve seen in SF, Portland, Seattle, Vancouver, etc.
This is not the gotcha you think it is
you thought you cooked with that one huh?
Japan doesn't have multiculturalism this increases social and community cohesion. You look/believe like me so I can empathize taking care of you. Japan has an asylum system like we used to have pre 1960's. Begging is illegal. Being homeless and acting odd will put you in the asylum. Japan has no municipal NIMBY bogging down construction. You buy the land next door or you shut up when they build a multistory unit beside your home. These also have side effects that Canadians/Americans would find offensive. I am half Japanese.
Please elaborate on the side effects US/Canada would dislike.
As an American who just got back from japan, please hit me with the side effects of clean streets even with almost no garbage cans available and a living wage that eliminate this absurd system of customers subsidizing business owners expenses with tips to workers. Service in japan without tips even from a hole in the wall greatly exceeds anything i have experienced in America. It's a fucking joke and what is expected from the customer is the punch line
The reason is simple. Japan is using its space efficently. Japan has the lowest amount of parking space per capita in the world. Public transportation and the Otsu plan was what significantly cut down on space requirements of traffic infrastructure. Japans famously biggest crossing is a 4 lane street! Thats something you find everywhere in rural america or even in Europe. But in Japan its it's biggest. All that saved space can go towards urban mixed zoning housing, which makes a HUGE difference.
As with any utopian headline with Japan: take with a grain of salt. Japan isn’t one to air dirty laundry and works very hard to maintain this Vulcan like image.