> And who wouldn't love to live in their "Depression" They have 2% unemployment and some of the highest quality of living standards in the world. Sounds like they are doing something right.

This guy.

I left Japan because I felt that the fabric of Japanese society was unraveling. Maybe that’s a bit dramatic, but at a minimum, the “social contract” was changing dramatically, and it was debatable whether the change was good or not. My opinion was that it was not.

Note, however, that I was not in Tokyo. Tokyo and the rest of Japan are basically different worlds. I may have a different opinion if I lived and worked there.

Things that made me sad:

- People with good, stable jobs were hyperconservative with their money, as though a crash had just happened or was imminent. This has killed the velocity of money in the country, and it’s terrible for the economy. Simple example, a group I used to be a member of used to have four big enkai (basically a party) at roughly between $100 and $250 a head (sometimes with hotel/onsen stayovers) as well as second, third, and fourth stops at additional bars. For folks with lesser means, the folks with greater means would pick up their share of the extra bars. Now that same group meets once a year at about $50-$60 a head and there is a 1-2 drink second bar. Incomes of the participants is the same or better than before. Note that I am not advocating one over the other, just that it’s indicative of the drastic slowing of the velocity of money in the economy.

- Once-proud towns are becoming villages (legal distinctions) and are having to merge into other towns. This has squashed a lot of the furusato identity, imo.

- Houses in provincial areas, some of them extremely nice, are either abandoned or only used during obon and maybe new year celebrations.

- Top students from top 20 universities are not guaranteed really good jobs any more. Decent ones, sure, but great ones? No. They are feeding much lower down on the food chain now.

- Ways for non-salarymen to have a good social/financial living have decreased dramatically. Far fewer OLs (love or hate the idea of them, they were a great way for men and women of a similar social status to meet/date/get married). For folks with no college, opening a little bar or snack is nothing like it used to be. It’s still possible, but the number of enterprising folks who can open a small bar and reasonably expect to make salaryman level of income or better (it the past, it was often much better) is far smaller than it used to be.

- Degree credentialing has become a thing. I think this was sort of brought over from the US, but the implementation has been terrible. For reference, in my department (I was a professor), the worst students and future professors were the only folks who applied to grad school. The worst students did so because they couldn’t get a job, and a masters degree would help them the next time around. The department took them for the money.

- My close friend and real estate agent and real estate manager actively discouraged me from buying a house. She said it was a bad investment unless you had access to privileged deal flow (like she did) or were going to die on that land (probably not that house).

I could go on. Needless to say, I did not think that my future in non-Tokyo Japan was going to be like living in some sort of utopia. Far from it.

I now live in California. It has its problems, too, but i much prefer it to where I was in Japan. Maybe Tokyo is different, but I wasn’t willing to make that bet over California.

Note that I love Japan, and there are certain aspects I miss about living there, but “great feelings about the current and future social fabric” is not one of them.