The news story calls the Japanese diet the most extravagant in history but fails to to mention that it is also the least interesting. Literally, Japan is Life without Spice.
FOOD FOR THOUGHT / Consumed– The often-finicky eating habits of Japanese consumers are creating problems on a global scale.
…Japan is at the top of the world in terms of “food mileage,” an indicator of the amount of transportation energy used to bring food to the tables of consumers… “The Japanese today have a diet that is more extravagant than the diet of any royalty of any nation of any period in history,” said a senior agriculture ministry official.…more…
–Fried Antarctic whale kabobs
My Japanese office here at Maybe-the-Largest-in-Japan Inc is more like an Adult Daycare Center than a business—everyone is over 50 years old and spend most of there time shuffling back and forth to the toilet. If South Korea’s workforce is aging quicker, they are in one big steaming pile of trouble!
South Korea
The aging workforce will weigh heavily on economic growth
The Korea Institute of Industrial Technology Evaluation and Planning (ITEP) recently said that Korea’s manufacturing workforce will soon begin to age at a quicker rate and like Japan, people in their early 50s will make up the biggest share of the working population in the manufacturing industry in the next 5 to 10 years…more…
<--My coworkers divining software design.
Every time I return from China I breath a sigh of relief of utter relief. China is a such difficult place that it makes the endless concrete slums of Bladerunner-on-bad-hair-day Tokyo seem beautiful and relaxing.
e.sinchew-i.com
China “Lags Behind US By 100 Years”
A recent report on China’s development may help allay rising concern about the so-called ‘China threat’….a recently published report on China’s Modernisation by the Chinese Academy of Science (CAS)…says that the country is more than 100 years behind the United States, 70 years behind Germany and 60 years behind Japan.
It’s perfectly legal for Japanese to send money to Kim Jong-Il’s regime so it can better attack Japan. Since North Korea last week fully owned up to having nuclear weapons to strike Japan, you would think it would be illegal to give North Korea any money, but nooooo that’s not the case. Sheesh.
Japan money going to North Korea decreases
Private Japanese funds flowing into North Korea last year fell early 35 percent from the previous year ago, a financial dailyreported Sunday.
The Nihon Keizai Shimbun cited unidentified Japanese finance ministry sources who reported the 2004 Japanese capital flow into the communist country reached $25.2 million (2.7 billion yen), its lowest level in four years.
Well suicide is part of the Japanese culture. The last time the national sales tax was increased (+20%) in the early 90s, there was a recession that lasted for years—actually the Japanese economy never recovered. This new increase ought to put the final nail in the coffin.
Bloomberg: Japan’s Planned Tax Increases Raise Concern of Recession —-Japanese income taxes aren’t going up until next year, and alarm bells are already ringing for the world’s second-largest economy. The increases, including the phasing out of an income tax rebate and a possible sales-tax increase, are designed to reduce the world’s largest public debt and to cover rising pension and welfare costs as Japan’s population grows older…”The danger is that it can sharply reduce the outlook for the economy,” says Rupkey. “The last time Japan took steps to reduce its public debt, the prescription nearly killed the patient.”…more…
The reason for these taxes is that Japan’s indebtness has risen to more than 160 percent of gross domestic product, which makes it much higher than that of the US or any other developed country. Japan’s only saving grace is that its government debt is owed to Japanese–it is not foreign debt.
This is damn odd news since the media has been running reports for years about how Japanese Yakuza is declining and they are having terrible trouble finding new recuits. Now, out of nowhere, the Japanese National Police Agency is claiming hiring has been up for the past nine year. Huh?
Number of gangsters in Japan up for ninth straight year
The number of gangsters in Japan grew last year for the ninth straight year despite a police crackdown, as the country’s biggest “yakuza” syndicate took in members from smaller groups and expanded its operations….
It’s been interesting how the Philippines as a nation has done everything possible to continue send it’s sex workers to Japan, without as much as a squeak about the ethics of this public policy. Of course, with 80,000 Filipino “entertainers” currently in Japan sending home some P1 billion annually…..that amounts to a large percentage of the Philippines economy.
Bishops support Japan’s new immigration policy
BRAVING the wrath of spurned entertainers, Filipino bishops Tuesday came out in support of Japan’s new immigration law that would severely limit the number of overseas performing artists who would be allowed to enter that country….[Filipino bishops] said the stricter law to be implemented this year would be highly effective against the trafficking of Filipino women who end up as sex workers in Japan….
Japan claims an exclusive economic zone over this fragment of coral reef known as Okinotori Island, far to the southeast of Okinawa. The so-called island is no more than a meter or so wide and high. But that doesn’t bother Gov Ishihara who wants Tokyo metropolitan government build a city power plant on the rock so Japan can meet the requirements for “visible economic activities” to claim the rock. As govenor (mayor) of Tokyo, Ishihara can have an foriegn policy, based on his right to administer this “island.” Sheesh.
Ishihara eyes power plant in sea to counter China’s activities
japantoday.com Tuesday, February 1, 2005 at 16:06 JST
TOKYO — The government said Tuesday it is considering ways to utilize Okinotori Island separately from Tokyo Gov Shintaro Ishihara, who plans to build an electric power plant in waters around the island apparently to counter China’s marine research activities. In making its policy on Japan’s southernmost island, located some 1,740 kilometers from Tokyo but administratively part of the capital….
With populations getting old too quickly in the wealthy countries, their economies as well as the funding of pensions and healthcare is gonna be shot. As households or the eldery tap their savings into retirement faster than young can build them, the “net wealth” of the entire First World drops. Damn. I’m glad I’ll be living into this trend on a remote farm for my retirement.
Aging rich nations face huge wealth shortfall
Editor’s Choice Article | Reuters.co.uk
“We project that Japan’s financial wealth will stop growing and enter an absolute decline over the next two decades, driving a 47 percent wealth shortfall,” the report said, noting this was the biggest percentage decline of the five countries.
The study showed the ratio of households in their peak earnings and savings period to those entering retirement will be low or falling in very country for the next two decades.
The Japanese tax authorities have no idea how swift foreign tax accountants and lawyers move. Japanese firms would dither for years trying to figure out the “proper” response to tax changes: Gaijin just DUMP-n-RUN.
Equity Strategists: Funds May Sell Japan Holdings
— Japanese stocks such as Asahi Tec Corp. and D&M Holdings Inc. may decline because proposed tax changes are likely to prompt private equity firms to sell shares….
…The government last month proposed a 20 percent tariff on profits made by non-residents and overseas companies in limited partnerships. The changes would also require foreign corporations and trusts to declare capital gains on sales of stakes in compaies owning real estate.
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