From: mccall@mksol.dseg.ti.com (fred j mccall 575-3539)
Subject: Re: Those Workaholic Japanese.
Organization: Texas Instruments Inc
Distribution: tx
Date: Mon, 28 Sep 1992 14:04:51 GMT

In <4678@d75.UUCP> curt@aixwiz.austin.ibm.com (Curt Finch/131072) writes:


>mccall@mksol.dseg.ti.com (fred j mccall 575-3539) writes:

>I've worked in Japan.  They work long hours, but they don't work that
>hard.  They actually seem kind of LAZY at work, which surprised me.  In
>fact their productivity (GNP/# of workers) is somewhat lower than it is
>in the US.  (The US is still #1 in this respect, although the Japanese
>are gaining.)  I could see why from working there.  

Well, I spent 3 years in the Far East, and surprisingly enough I both
agree and disagree with you.  When you consider that a large part of
the reason they have a lower productivity per worker is that their
economy is currently supporting some 700,000+ EXCESS workers (workers
who are in jobs which do not need to be done), that implies that those
who ARE doing jobs which actually contribute are working somewhat
harder.  How hard they actually do work (physically) depends on the
job, just like it does over here.

>Work is a way of
>life for them, they don't see it as some sort of punishment, or evil
>necessity, like Americans do.  They live to work instead of working to
>live.  They know they'll be working at this same company for the next
>30 YEARS, so what's the rush, why kill yourself.

The initial statements are true, but the conclusion doesn't follow.
That conclusion is arrived at from the standpoint of a Western worker,
which we have both agreed the Japanese do not hold.  Yes, they know
they'll be working for the same company for the next 30 years.  This
sounds fine when you think about a 20 year old worker -- but not so
fine when you think about a 50 year old worker.  Since, as you
categorize it, they "live to work", why doesn't the follow-up occur to
you that they are going to quite willingly work until they drop?
After all, they're not particularly interested in working just to
work, either.  The typical Japanese worker (excluding the current
generation) works out of LOYALTY and works TO CONTRIBUTE.  Is it
really so incredible, given those two simple facts, that eventually a
relatively large number will work themselves to death?

>Their language has a word that ours doesn't.  So what.  It has a
>grammar that ours doesn't also.  Are we supposed to construe THIS as
>some scientific proof that they're all overworked to the point of early
>death?  Maybe it just proves they're more aware of the problem than we
>are, (for various cultural reasons,) not that the problem is more
>common.

Languages generally don't have single word descriptions for complex
things unless those things are relatively common.  This is why the
typical Eskimo language will have half a dozen or more different words
for snow, each of which will be descriptive of a slightly different
type.  It is also why Japanese includes a single word to describe
someone who works themself to death.  Oh, yes, and by the way.  No one
said anything about "all".  It's helpful when you want to argue
against a statement to 'enhance' it like this, but hardly useful to
reasonsed discussion.

>They're life span is quite a bit longer, that provides at least some
>evidence to the contrary.

Really?  Why?  What, pray tell, is the typical RETIREMENT AGE in
Japan?  What would you expect it to be in a country where people, as
you so eloquently put it, "live to work"?  As for that "much longer"
lifespan, you might like to consider the differences in overall
lifestyle to explain that.  Small details like a much healthier diet,
better exercise patterns, more regard for their own well-being, etc.

>The fact is you don't have to kill yourself to make a great car.  You
>just have to care.  Their unions and workers and management do.  Ours
>(especially our union leaders and management) don't.]

You seem to be arguing with statements I never made.  While that might
be enjoyable, I don't know that it's all that productive toward
disproving what I said.

-- 
"Insisting on perfect safety is for people who don't have the balls to live
 in the real world."   -- Mary Shafer, NASA Ames Dryden
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Fred.McCall@dseg.ti.com - I don't speak for others and they don't speak for me.