Japanese People are TERRIBLE According to this Study

Are Japanese people really the worst workers in the world?
ARTICLE: news.livedoor.com/article/det...
Edited by Luke: / lukecraigphoto
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[@felisconcolori]

People wonder why isekai is a popular genre. Hmm.

[@danielmokobia106]

lol

[@fmor2779]

One of the reasons Zom 100 was created.

[@norg18]

Ah yes Japan's breaking bad

[@1Manimation1]

what's esekai?

[@domsta455]

💯

[@animechic420]

I noticed that anime has a habit of letting viewers know how full of shit things can be in Japan.

[@nielsmichiels1939]

_Miss Koroitsu of the monster development department_ is a perfect example of this.

[@lssjgaming1599]

Zom 100 is prolly the best example and can be extrapolated to the issues in other countries that also have similar issues with insane work culture and late stage capitalism

[@fmor2779]

@@lssjgaming1599 I was just thinking about that anime XD But the worst part is that Zom 100 is not the only one that portrayed the soul sucking environment in Japan. Even in light romance novels ,which are supposed to be chiller than other genres, you can find examples of this. Sometimes I see the most exaggerated parts in anime and can't help but think "Are the japanese ok?"

[@AdamYJ]

Aggretsuko comes to mind.

[@Leonlion0305]

while working in one of the most overworked and underpaid industry. Man, the irony.

[@SynymynBuhnz]

I'm not going hangout with my boss after work unless I'm getting paid for it, I'm not doing company shit unless I'm on company time and paid.

[@MouseCIick]

What a team player. Meanwhile thousands of graduates struggle to find a job to jump-start their career. Freaking love to see it.

[@johnjackson9751]

@@MouseCIickBeing a team player for your JOB is not worth it if you aren’t bring PAID

[@MouseCIick]

@@johnjackson9751 yup because it’s all about money. Which explain why the world is turning inside out. I’m gonna stop helping that grandma cross the street every morning before work and start charging her 5 dollars.

[@lolzha8163]

No, work and private life is different. If i am going to a company activity then that is on conpany time and money. If you help an old lady cross the streets then that is out of your on volition, and you wont get paid for that.​@MouseCIick

[@sorubro2193]

​@@MouseCIick work SHOULD be all about money

[@randomality]

I used to be an officer in the Navy and this shit happens all the time in the military. I was always told I had to go to a lot of officer outings even though it was supposed to be voluntary. I was always the first to leave. Eventually I stopped going. I hated them. As a result, I was seen as not a team player and was ranked lower. I would always invite my division out to lunch on Fridays since it would mean not eating food on the ship and it was during the day, not night which is for them. I always emphasized that it's not mandatory and would bring back takeout for those that decided to stay behind because they were finishing work or just didn't want to go out. Also would sometimes use the lunch as a way to let some of them go home early if they didn't have anything left to do on the ship so they can get an early weekend. As a result, everyone worked really hard and my division was the only one with no problems. When I left, I was ranked pretty low amongst my peers, even though I got results and far exceeded expectations. Doesn't matter. My team trusted me and I trusted them and they knew I wasn't about playing politics. I fought for their leave times and made it work and would take the hit for being perceived as a lenient officer. I don't care. When we deploy, we don't get to have time away for our families and ourselves. You're damn right I'm gonna let them take whatever time off they need when we're not and I have the power to let that happen.

[@sai6724]

You're a good man, I appreciate people like you

[@unturned6066]

I've had similar experiences in my workplaces. The fact that it's not just over-time, but often meaningless social (drinking) events that they try to force you to join is amazing to me. And it seems to have led my entire generation to feel like they're "a-social", because they've been told there's something wrong with them for not loving these events.

[@timeforgottenprince8271]

If only we had more people like you. Godspeed to whatever your goals may be.

[@samuraichicken2315]

It sounds a lot like a case where management is disconnected from the workers, so they look at things like group social events to determine who is a team player. I'm a night owl so I used to start work at 9 am and finish at 10 pm. My boss thought I was lazy and kept praising the guy who came to work at 7:30 am and left work at 5:30 pm.

[@LilithNakamura]

I’ll raise a pint to you.

[@barbos1507]

The fact that worker is obligated to treat the company as a second family is abyssmal. Where is any guranatee that the company won't just ditch it's workers, who put their soul into labor?

[@dydx_]

Well for starters, you can't get fired.

[@madensmith7014]

It came with the idea that the company wouldn't just fire their workers and ensure their employment until retirement, giving employees of stability. It was a give-and-take sort of employment culture, the employer also had their own set of responsibilities in this equation Of course this idea came crashing down during many recessions they had and some companies have found ways to exploit that culture.

[@xanv8051]

Company trying to convince you it's family is cultish.

[@David-gj6dc]

Because lifetime employment was surprisingly prevalent in the past. Things have changed a lot in recent years, but if you could be sure you would be spending your entire life with the same group of coworkers don't you think you would want to at least get along?

[@sboinkthelegday3892]

For seconders, in Japan a lot of pension obligations are privatized. Meaning "big corporations" like nintendo don't invest in EA style graphics, because that money is actually in PENSION FUNDS for the people who EARNED that money, not "company profit" to do with as they please and hire more indentured servants. You know what there's more guarantee of? That when Japanese people blow out, less Japanese than American people do it TO OTHER PEOPLE. That's why they have that self-harm rate, there's that population like the 21 000 Americans who decide to go out silently. But they lack the OTHER 18 000 who go out with a bang and off OTHER people, amounting to 41 000 yearly gun violence deaths.

[@Janokins]

What's probably more interesting than comparing the countries with each other, is comparing the countries with themselves over time. You might also want to plot inflation on the same axis. I find people are more motivated when they are compensated fairly for their labour.

[@Tainami_]

And appreciated by their employer! Having a manager/boss that compliments you for your work makes a massive difference

[@stephsteph4503]

Yes, compared to inflation in Japan, America's percent change on most goods is 4 times higher, and house prices in my area and rents have doubled. Considering moving back to Japan tbh. I was there 6 years and it is still better than here for my situation, at least. I will never afford a house here.

[@gerhardaryawardana72]

​​@@stephsteph4503 Then go. If you think you can have a better work/life balance in Japan, go there. Especially since you were already there and probably have the qualifications needed to work there. You clearly think going there would be better for you, so do what you think is good for you. But hearing americans whine about house prices in the US when the suburb houses are generally still in the half million USD or less range or gas prices, as someone living in Germany where suburb houses are often in the 600k to 1 million euro range (give or take) with way more expensive gas will never stop being funny.

[@stephsteph4503]

​@@gerhardaryawardana72My husband needs some convincing, so I am studying to take the highest level Japanese proficiency test (I have the second highest rn), and we will go if he can get a job with an employer there, which as a software engineer, he should be able to. I was teaching English at a university in the US where student tuition is 50,000 USD+ per year. I was making $13 USD per hour; which is my state's minimum wage. The pay is, after taxes, 100% the cost of a one bedroom apartment's rent. Half a million dollars for a house is expensive; even a quarter of a million is too expensive. I want to go to Japan because I can get paid a little more even though the yen is weaker and buy a house for under 100k USD. I will never retire if I stay.

[@immortal_shrooms6757]

@@gerhardaryawardana72i dont know much but maybe the extent of what their currency can buy is something to consider when comparing costs. Cause at least in my country, equivalent money value via conversion does not equal same things it can buy

[@KarlaGarcia-ld6mv]

I'm a photographer currently in Japan and the thing is about the companies in Japan they take advantage of people and they pass thier mistakes onto the worker especially the older generation has a habit of doing this. That's the thing abou my husband's former company it was shut down and he was stressing out about the company. I legit told him that the companies fuck ups are not his problems and if they have the balls to put themselves into that situation where it costs the employees jobs and at least show some damn self respect of telling the truth of how got themselves into that situation in the first place. He was amazed of how I saw the problem he quit about 1 week later, and he had an IT job lining up, and now he's content with his job. Safe to say Japan needs to change I was never a fan of working under someone and I'm very vocal about.

[@Sirawxy]

This make me feel like those companies are cults lol😂

[@KarlaGarcia-ld6mv]

Someone actually made a video about different companies in Japan. How they are finding loop laws that only benefit the Ceos and not the employees. The other is it shows the red flags about the companies.

[@ericng5707]

@@Sirawxy Some Japanese companies still make workers stand up and recite the company slogan/mission statement everyday during the all-hands morning meetings. And there is an obsession with company principles (for example, "the Toyota Way"). So yeah, you can say it's cult-like.

[@Vampgamergeek]

@@KarlaGarcia-ld6mvwhat channel I wanna know now

[@Vampgamergeek]

@@ericng5707I use to have to say the slogan also and stopped going to the meetings because there’s no point to them 30 mins standing and the important part is just the last 10 mins where they explain what food we have or don’t have Smfh annoying company rules

[@DammitBobby]

Don't trust business owners to understand the mentality and emoitions of their employees. Of course they are going to downplay the severity of their toxic work culture, they are literally financially incentivized to say so.

[@autumnlove96able]

Please learn how to spell oml.

[@lyndylou752]

Please understand not everyone is a word nazi@@autumnlove96able

[@DammitBobby]

@@autumnlove96able I'm just rapid fire texting on my phone buddy. I don't care.

[@ericx6969]

word people are weak speed readers and writers@@DammitBobby

[@perrywinkle5000]

Because a business owner has never been an employee before, right? What a cartoonish view of what business owners actually deal with. Not only did many of them risk their entire livelihoods on starting a business that they hoped would succeed one day, but they also have to worry about actually running a business that has employees, sometimes hundreds of them. Meaning not only do they have to make payroll, but they also need to be in legal compliance with all that governmental red tape.

[@lemmiecat]

I also notice this in Korean companies as well. When I worked at an after school academy, I had to basically work Monday to Sunday at times (at the academy or at home). I worked 12 hours but did not get overtime pay because it wasn't part of my contract. I don't fault my boss at all because it was her first time running an academy but let's just say within a year I worked there, my health got so bad (physically and mentally) that all of my doctors told me that I should quit. But even I felt bad "quitting" so I requested unpaid vacation off for a month.

[@frenchfries1696]

Yeah, japanese & korean company work culture is bad bad. Reminded me of that korean webtoon mangaka who asked for some unpaid days off (because she was pregnant and she didn't feel quite well). The manager & company didn't give her permission until she had a miscarriage.

[@druvor]

​@@frenchfries1696 for those who are curious: it's Juniljus / Yoton Kuu, the artist for Roxana

[@clarehidalgo]

Part of the issues is Confucianism, why the whole "don't mess with social order" in the work culture of Japan and Korea is so big is because of Confucian philosophy

[@nmmeswey3584]

​@@frenchfries1696Thats so horrible it sounds like an urban legend, do you rememeber where you saw it or what the persons name was?

[@coffeeblackisbestdrink]

​@@clarehidalgo funny that when you bring up it was a mistake, some brainlet tells you confucianism glorifies good values. Yeah.. sure look at Japan and Korea.

[@CitadelX]

I was teaching someone English a few weeks ago in Japan. I asked the guy why he hadn't had a lesson for a few motnhs and he told me he had just finishe dworking 70 days in a row from 8:30am to 12-2am everyday. Said he only had time to go home and sleep and didnt get paid overtime because its illegal to do that much overtime. He didn't report his company because it "would be bad for the company". So this coupled with constantly seeing elementany school students out late at night when i go home around 9:30pm because of Juku., I just can't comprehend this mindset

[@YurinanAcquiline]

Yikes.

[@CalmClamFam]

God that’s terrible. If reporting the violation would be bad for the company, then the company shouldn’t be allowed to exist anyway because it’s not functioning efficiently. With all those hours you work without pay, you aren’t an employee anymore. You’re a slave.

[@Shin-Chara]

Nature points out the folly of men, but men don't like listening to women.

[@tapiwakay]

What are elementary students doing out at 930p?

[@lavelleandrae27]

It’s actually middle school students out late for studying.

[@FacuCarbonel]

The thing I found quite funny about the japanese 'tradition' or 'culture' around working is the fact that it's not a tradition or anything. In the 70s when the economic bubble was at it's peak the way japan worked was kinda revolutionary, they were not afraid of introducing new ways and tech in their work environment. What I see around the 'working culture' nowadays in japan is just old dudes refusing to change the way they found in those years to manage business, because that's the way they found at those days to make business good, ignoring the fact that to achieve that economic position they needed to modernice their practices in the work environment but look at them nowadays still using fax believing it's still 1972 or something..

[@FacuCarbonel]

tldr the ones who invented the way japanese business works are the same old guys that are too afraid to modernice nowadays

[@Pepe-dq2ib]

Whats wrong with fax? Its actually faster than mailing and even faster than scanning and emailing docs. Fax, sign, fax back all under a minute.

[@FacuCarbonel]

@@Pepe-dq2ib there is nothing wrong with fax, there are still plenty good use cases for it, but the way japan uses it it's just a sign of no digitalization

[@kekbin1697]

This. A very clear example of this can be observed coming from toyota ceo himself, akio toyoda. Dude hate evs and never bothered to invest anything on it despite current trends.

[@Pepe-dq2ib]

@@kekbin1697 EV is stupid and Hybrid is the way to go. Not even mentioning that most of the world is nowhere near ready for full EV.

[@chromaticfrog7407]

Drinking with your boss is one of the dumbest things I’ve ever heard. You want me to be more motivated? Pay me more.

[@Mr.WestcottX]

Facts. more money

[@thenonexistinghero]

It is stupid AND it costs money. It's just a stupid cultural thing and even worse is that you can get fired if you don't. It'd be one thing if it was uncommon, but regular drinking after work with the boss or colleagues is such a common thing that no escaping it from most jobs.

[@D0MiN0ChAn]

What about people who don't drink alcohol? Or is that just not a thing? Is it just *expected* that everyones drinks, no matter the circumstances? 😵

[@markigirl2757]

@@D0MiN0ChAnyeppp japan priotizes harmony of the group at the expense of the individual.

[@halycon404]

It's a... Sanity check in Japan I guess... Is the best way to put it. Japanese workers can't criticize their work, their bosses, or the company. At work. That's the country's culture. Those drinking parties are supposed to be where bosses find out what their workers actually think. Supposed to be. They don't have to actually drink, just have a drink in front of them. And the other part of the social construct in Japan is it's just a drunk person rambling even if they didn't take a single sip, it just has to be in front of them. Whatever they say is safe to say. It's a polite fiction to allow the company to get real input. Or it should be. It was. For hundreds of years. The bosses aren't holding up their side of the agreement in fixing the problems. Making it worthless. The custom is there without the reason it existed in the first place.

[@pandaeyez]

Its no surprise that the defenders are middle aged to elderly Japanese people. If the defence came from the young generation then that would be more convincing. Of course Japan placed last, various terms and concepts only exist or are very common in Japan, such as "death by overwork" black company" "hikkikomori" etc and these are failures of a society in which the work ethic is too burdensome and results in extreme societal pressure and a lack of work passion. Couple that with a weak economy and high cost of living, there is no or very little incentive to work hard or enjoy ones work. Those defenders are extremely out of touch, are privileged and are speaking on behalf of the rest of Japan. Japan needs to change. Employee satisfaction will increase as the gruelling work ethic lessens.

[@Zelmel]

It's literally peak "okay boomer" plus the weird tendency of people in general to want to force others to have to go through what they did even if it's unnecessary and awful.

[@AManChoosesASlaveObeys]

Shame Japan has the majority of the population be elderly people. They live in their world... and when the real world speaks about how their world is not real, they don't accept it. It's the same as any political, religious or I could even go as far as sports to say that they have this attitude. Nobody wants to be proven wrong, so... must be some sort of twist, right? Some conspiracies? RIGHT?

[@Zelmel]

@@AManChoosesASlaveObeys This is unfortunately how it is in most of the most powerful countries in the world.

[@_Jay_Maker_]

The United States isn't far off from becoming exactly like this socially and we're starting to see it already. Decades of pushing the 40 hour work week have killed motivation and are driving people up the wall. Something big is going to change over here.

[@NihonTiger584]

That is because, Joey is BSing. One guy was in 30s

[@lonesoul663]

Who would want to hang out with their boss? 😂 Unless your boss is like Joey or something.

[@AfianySnow29802]

Don't know lol. 🙄😒😑.

[@roeig.7283]

My boss is a nice guy. Wouldn't mind hanging out with him after work. I think the problem is that in Japan it's obligatory so this interaction is artificial..

[@LeniBats]

If it were an actual choice and the boss is actually a decent person, there wouldn't be an issue. But, companies and horrible bosses make these "Team Building" events mandatory, or they say you have a choice while gaslighting and guilt-tripping you into feeling obligated to attend. Work is work to me. It's not friends, not family, or anything else besides a paycheck and it does not intrude on my personal time because I block work on my phone on my days off and I don't answer work emails on my off days either.

[@ootts456]

When you don't have a partner friends or hobbies, basically when you have no life outside the work

[@siaorihara]

@@LeniBatsreminds me of how at my old job, we were required to be at employee meetings and that we were mandated to come to them. Even tho they fell on my days off. Like there’s one day a week there was no days off for anyone MAKE IT THEN. I didn’t even like being at them cause I was used at the punching bag for everything wrong with the store 😩 and the one meeting I didn’t go to cause I was told it was cancelled when apparently it wasn’t, that gave them even more ammo to fire at me 😑 I’m glad I quitted after I got screamed at for taking an approved LEGALLY REQUIRED break(even tho I was technically allowed 2 with how it was 2x the time I was supposed to work between breaks)

[@chosone2]

*looks at the current Nijisanji situation* yup, sounds about right

[@TheRealZura]

But that's the EN side

[@Ragea77]

@@TheRealZura All the Management from what has been said is in Japan and at the least the management needs approval from the higher ups in Japan and this culture clash seems to be a big part of the issue

[@ryana5435]

@@Ragea77 so EN side management is all Japanese who can speak English?

[@mitacestalia7532]

​@@TheRealZuraNah, JP side is the same thing. The difference is, in Japan no one can complain because it's part of their working culture. Yeah, basically the reason why Nijisanji messed up SO BADLY is because they bring their Japanese working culture outside Japan. They didn't not understand that outside Japan, such a working standard is frowned. Like bruh, they didn't even hire English translator until now...

[@scarlet5122]

​@Ragea77 to be fair, there has been a lot of bullying and harassment in niji JP aswell soo it's a niji thing all together at the same time you'll can also look at wactor which is arguably Worse then niji

[@dir3en8grey]

Im in the USA, and I have been working for about 20 years. I learned one lesson you won't regret time spent with loved ones, but you will regret time missed with them. A job will replace you faster than you can be put in the ground. If im not being paid, im not doing work "team building" if they cared so much about it they would pay me.

[@Mr.WestcottX]

Indeed. For long work hours

[@skvltdmedia]

And if you're not personally given a stake/shares in a company, treat it exactly like what it is.

On the spot translation issue: Landstad→ Randstad. Is a big corp that does consulting for HR stuff; and that’s going to make the results a bit skewed, given that they also work for other consulting corps. And those tend to be soul-sucking jobs.

[@nielsmichiels1939]

Belgian and Dutch viewers represent.

[@firetruckenthusiast8596]

Funnily enough, Randstad is owned by a Japanese firm

[@qwmx]

Thankyou. Randstad is in Australia too.

[@florianreimann3166]

We had similar situations back in school with some events that were "voluntary participation" but if you don't participate you're made to be the odd one and everyone giving you the stink eye. And even during my apprenticeship as a horticulturist, my contract stated "workdays monday to friday" and "working on saturday and holidays during busy periods is voluntarily" but then it was always like "how dare you say you have plans and you're not gonna work on a holiday, while everyone else does". If my contract says to work on saturdays I have no problem with this, but don't give me this hypocritical "voluntary" crap that's meant to exploit herd mentality. And spending my free time and money with people I don't like, when I'm tired and just want to go home? F*** off! As for the Japanese people I guess a big part is just the changing times, after the war people had to work their ass off rebuilding their country, of course that gives you pride and hard worker mentality and then as you mentioned there was the economic bubble, but how can you convey and instill this in younger generations that haven't experienced this and live in a totally different world? you can't

[@Mirro18]

i think rebuilding also has one big advantage: you see the result easier. It's like getting to learn a new skill. You have a lot of leeway to fuck up because the way up has so much room for improvement... it is hard not to. But the closer you are to "perfection" the more effort it takes to rise even a single %. I notice that with farming stuff with my dad and grandfather. My grandpa was the first generation to get tractors. To get a lot of exciting chemicals and access to crops that bring in so much more grain than before! And the prices had not caught up to the development yet! Because all of that stuff was slow, because it was efficient but not yet that efficient. And as that whole growth tapers off... it looks worse and worse, because you are starting to hit the ceiling on things. Prices update also so much quicker. and in comparison my dad makes less than his father used to make with not even comperable effort.

[@ericx6969]

teacher pet lol

[@ralphdary7050]

I think that's the problem right there. They're stuck in the past. It's why their entertainment has been feeling off.

[@CordeliaWagner1999]

Germany was destroyed after WWII but we Manager to develoe a healthy work culture and a very good work life balance.

[@florianreimann3166]

Now that's just the biggest BS I've heard lately xD That's something only a person who get's way too much money for way to less work and no sense of reality would say. please try to research this, read some statistics and realize that the working environment here in Germany sucks and get's even worse every year

[@QuesoGr7]

Like my friend said about the fake employee passion in reference to FMA: "You ask them to sacrifice an arm and a leg, you get a fake person."

[@stephanieok5365]

Under rated comment here for the magnificent play on words. 🎉

[@MooreThanCosplay]

I don't understand how people can believe they are still in an economic bubble that happened nearly 40 years ago.

[@rigobertoitachijohnson]

if you're in Japan and have people around you born in the 1970s you'll definitely think that way

[@Rexhunterj]

@@rigobertoitachijohnson This is exactly why the US is in such deep trouble, the boomers kept telling their kids and their grandkids and their great grandkids that it was harder when they were kids and that when they were kids they walked two ways through snow up hill to get to school. To keep working hard because eventually like them, you'll succeed, completely ignoring the fact they were born into a world set up for them by the silent generation and the great generation before them, a time that was quite literally silver gilded for those whom put hard work in. But the modern world does not value hard work, or the spirit that it takes to put it in, they value results and don't care about the means of getting the results.

[@dudeistpreist5721]

Most older people think about when they were in their late teens and early 20s. It's one of the reasons why 30 and 40 year old teachers would bitch about racism and homophobia in the 2010s. Personally the disconnect has gotten worse and we're still making alot of these decisions as if we're still in the 80s or 90s.

[@Fred-yq3fs]

Japan hasn't made enough kids for a very long time now. So younger ones with fresh ideas are and will simply be vastly outnumbered by old dudes. That means Japan won't refresh anytime soon.

[@ericwilliams1659]

Hey, Americans are not very smart. They think they can become a global manufacturer leader like they did in the 60's. But have shut down and shipped jobs over seas to make a larger profit.

[@youravantgarde]

As an American I can promise you we all hate working and wish we could just win the lottery.

[@XNyxX]

Yep, we only work out of necessity to live.

[@HalAnime2]

Don’t forget the US is still the land of opportunity and an immigration driven country, business wise there’s a huge “rags to riches” mentality.

[@AnimeFreakpz]

FRRR I just want a forever vacation

[@xanv8051]

Companies convincing you it's family like it's church

[@NihonTiger584]

Exactly. And in Joey's country. They dont even work

[@zburnham]

This is happening everywhere. Working culture everywhere changed when COVID happened. People found new work patterns that they liked and refused to give them up when things started getting back to nominal. Over here in the States there was real culture shock from upper management when they found out that no, they couldn't treat their people like they used to, because they will leave (at least in the USA, where we have full employment). It led to a lot of very confused managers who were used to pushing people around to get their way, who suddenly found themselves without workers after they treated them badly. Before COVID they could push people around all they want because job flexibility was being kept rigid by the old school "that's the way we've always done it" culture. The good managers/companies realized that they had to start treating their people like they didn't want them to leave, which was 180 degrees from "the beatings will continue until morale improves". The bad ones doubled down on their bad treatment and found themselves without workers. They whined that "people didn't want to work", when the real problem was that their workers realized they could do better somewhere else and went there. You could say to them "No, they want to work, they just don't want to work for YOU". Which a bunch of hard-wired micromanaging managers found impossible to understand, after decades of being able to treat their reports like garbage. I imagine Japan is experiencing something similar, except without the full employment that the USA currently enjoys. (3% unemployment is full employment. Any lower and it starts to hurt the economy because companies can't find people to hire.) So they're stuck in the jobs that Americans would ditch in a heartbeat. We had the Big Quit after COVID passed, because managers expected people to come back into the office and continue to be treated like garbage, so they just went somewhere else. This is really the way the labor market is SUPPOSED to work. Companies shouldn't be dangling jobs in front of people like they're doing them a favor by hiring them. Workers should be making employers fight over them.

[@zerotimeleft]

It's always the unstoppable force of nature that forces humanity to change xd

[@TheoCynical]

Oh yeah, those remote jobs due to COVID really opened many Americans’ eyes to what work culture could be because of the push and when COVID died down, the bosses wondered why people weren’t too thrilled to return back to work, back to driving an hour to work when instead they could fulfill a similar workload from home; along with the spike in anxiety upon the return. Add in the newer generations living in it too and quiet quitting, you get a growing resentment for the older system of work. You are definitely right. People are looking at the silliness of this system and seeing a better way forward . S/o to Dan Price.

[@user-sc7fk5ys6x]

Similar situation in medieval England after the bubonic plague decimated the population of peasants that landlords could enslave: Look up the Watt Tyler Rebellion.

[@danielschrecker9996]

People also realized that career advancement no longer exists. The harder you work, the more work you get, because they know you'll do it. Layoffs come in waves, so it doesn't matter what you've done to set yourself aside from the crowd, you're just another ID number on their balance sheets that needs to be purged occasionally. Hard work =/= Good life. That's the problem. You have to "work smart" which usually devolves into knowing how to lie/defraud/scam to get ahead. All these corporate systems reward someone only when they do the bare minimum to not get fired. Work hard and you get more work. Work the bare minimum, and you get peace of mind. The company isn't loyal, so why should you be? That's exactly what led to the Soviet Union's collapse. Too many people trying to game the system rather than doing real work. That's what happens when people work because they have to, not because they want to. Covid made it clearer than ever what the bare minimum effort entails, and so people have settled on exactly that, no more and no less. It's the companies' own fault for buying into the hysteria and letting the curtain slip. There's no going back.

[@firefly618]

11:30 Just a quick note, "writing code" is a very creative job (unless you ended up in some sort of dystopian soulless company.) Therefore it's very hard to do without motivation. This may be difficult to understand if you have no idea how coding works, but that's how it is. People code for fun, in fact most of the open source software was written that way, from Linux to Firefox and KHTML (which later became Chrome), not to mention videogames, and this is a trait shared with other creative endeavours. How many people do accounting for fun?

[@Japanimal1992]

I live in Japan and have worked at 3 Japanese companies. The reason why we all hate the work culture (and the reason foreign workers very very rarely stay in Japan long term) is very simple; We work longer hours for the half the pay of other countries. Salaries haven't changed in decades, yet cost of living is increasing rapidly.

[@skvltdmedia]

And no one will speak up to avoid being THAT one person everyone will frown upon. I've talked to my share of people about this whole community-first mentality, and everyone hates it silently.

[@johnnymartinjohansen]

@@skvltdmedia If everyone hates it, then why is everyone frowning upon anyone who speaks up?

[@maythesciencebewithyou]

Cost of living has been increasing everything in the world while salaries haven't changed much. So that one is not Japan specific. Many Americans work longer hours than the Japanese.

[@koroyaku]

@@johnnymartinjohansen Mob mentality, literally. Japan is basically a hive mind.

[@Japanimal1992]

@@maythesciencebewithyou All of that is false. Sure that issue exists elsewhere, but if you check Bank of Japan statistics, the average/median salary in Japan has been between 3.4 - 4 million yen/ year since 1990, while the cost of living has drastically increased. in the US, the cost of living has increased, but salaries are constantly increasing by A LOT. in 1990 the average US salary was 35k, today it's 60k in 1990 the average salary in Japan was 3.4 million, today it's 3.6 million yen. Americans do not work longer hours than Japanese. G7 labor statistics show that of all the G7 countries (that includes the US) Japanese workers work the longest hours and have the lowest productivity of all G7 countries.

[@DB20204]

My asocial self would quickly become a pariah. Once I'm off the clock, I'm going home. I've got errands to run, meals to cook, animals to feed, household chores, exercising. I'm gonna see those coworkers the next morning. They are not my family. If a company wants me to think of them like one big happy family, then I want to see my name listed on the CEO's Will since I'm supposed to be family. Having a friendly boss and being able to talk about what you did over the weekend is great. But going out for dinner with them every week, that's like some weird mental game. Errs on the side of Stockholm syndrome. If someone has the power over my promotion, I'm not clinking beer glasses with them and discussing my unhealthy obsession with kpop. It's also grossly "old boys club". Like, it's all about playing the game and who you know, rather than how hard you work. In that sort of work culture, I'd assume everyone in management only got there because of their ability to network and not their actual talent or skill. In a skill based work environment, socializing after work wouldn't be so emphasized. That's my hot take.

[@OzixiThrill]

"My asocial self would quickly become a pariah. Once I'm off the clock, I'm going home. I've got errands to run, meals to cook, animals to feed, household chores, exercising" And the funny part is, you'll end up roughly as if not more effective as the rest of the people in such a place.

[@PvtFlowers]

Its funny you think you could get a job in japan.

[@DB20204]

@@PvtFlowers *It's.

[@PvtFlowers]

@@DB20204 this is why no one in your life enjoys your company.

[@DB20204]

@@PvtFlowers Have you tried therapy?

[@emzomnia]

Having passion for your job can be a slippery slope, not to say you can't have enthusiasm for your work but from what I have experience and picked up from others over time is when you put a lot of energy day in and day out for a job it can easily lead to burnout unless the employer takes steps to mitigate it. In this modern age of work, productivity and the bottom line dictate the work environment, this comes at the cost of the worker's mental and physical health by making them less efficient to perform at their best. I feel the pressure for Japanese people(if not many other Asian countries) from a young age to adulthood is trying to push hard upwards to succeed to get a good job. Then still pushing hard again to meet social norms in their workplace. This is why I'm not surprised that there are high levels of depression and unaliving in their society.

[@metalface_villain]

i think you should be passionate about your job but you also gotta get fairly compensated for it and have enough free time to enjoy life outside of work and have your basic needs covered. i think being passionate about what you do will make you enjoy your job and produce better results but long hours achieve the opposite. working more than 5 hours has huge diminishing returns, after a certain hours of working you are there just to be there and it will make you miserable and result in a burnout.

[@gaerekxenos]

@@metalface_villain Passion helps, but it isn't the most necessary thing ever when it comes to making sure work gets done -- as long as there are proper standards for getting work done that are met (which doesn't happen more often than not when it comes to people who lack passion). Proper compensation and rewards *is* necessary though Where passion might be more relevant are the people relations. If you're just dead and don't care, you probably aren't going to interact with other people very well if it isn't strictly necessary to talk to others. And lack of proper interaction can screw up worker morale, so... obviously people who are hiring will want people with fairly good amounts of passion

[@nyankers]

I don't think people should be passionate about their job. That passion gets abused. I think people should be passionate about themselves and their own abilities, and bring that passion to their dispassionate job.

[@sdarkpaladin]

6:50 That's Josephine Teo... a Singaporean Politician. And that's all I'm going to say about that.

[@NihonTiger584]

Different woman. Dumbphuck. Teo is common name. As is Joey.

[@Kelvin_Foo]

The one who is famous in SG for her bad takes, including housing and the TFR...

[@platinumbridge]

Yes you don't need space to have seggs. *eyeroll*

[@zachlee3945]

@@Kelvin_Foo and for crying in parliament as well 😂

[@patchoulidaze7193]

oh small space teo? fuck

[@breloopharos1919]

Ive known the fact about Japanese workers going out and drinking with peers/bosses but it still baffles me to this day. As an introverted adult, im totally fine talking all day at my 9-5 and sometimes an hour after i clock out if im atill chatting with someone, but what if the workers are also introverts, or don't drink or need to spend time with people outside of the workplace? Personally I think it's incredibly unhealthy, mostly mentally. I've always hated the culture of how you're giving a "bad image" if you wanna go home after work. Can't really force a whole country to change tho, it's a country with wildly different perspectives compared an American, like me. 🤷‍♂️

[@TheoCynical]

Yep and they’ll continue to hit the decline under the pressure cooker of social conflicts reach an apex. Someone’s gonna get too tired of the nonsense and stand up. The old system can’t support everyone…

[@ufgatorbearify]

Very interesting topic. I was a salaryman in Osaka in early 90s. I moved from Florida out of if Uni with 4 years of Japanese and a Japanese minor. Even then i saw this lack of passion. It seemed everyone was doing what they needed to do to for appearance rather than performance. One example of this was how everyone stayed after end if day bell unril the boss left. Sorry i did not folllow this rule😊 when i did stay late, i noticed most people weren't necessarily working but just looking busy until he left. Except of course rhe females who were forced to clean and make coffee and snacks I also had the exact experience of being required to go to after work party. A person i didn't even know was retiring about 3 weeks after i started. My work friend said i had to go. Fortunately, i had nothing else to do so it was rarher happy to go. But the obligation to drink alcohol was so different from USA business. It wasn't just i had to go i had to do what everyone else was doing. Again, i loved it, had a great izakaya experience but i also felt weird cuz i had to do it. Another interesting thing was the lack of work i was given. My first 2 months i would sit at my desk and translate Le Mis...yes seriously, they were paying me to sit there and read a book. I started reading the instruction manuals and suggestions on fixing the English translation which was sometimes wrong. They didn't care at all. Eventually, i asked fir something to do so they had me join the blueprint group and file away blueprints once a week. The 12 of us would go to meeting room and correlate the blueprints into piles. Then the mass junken *rock,paper, scissors* to get the pecking order. Then first would oick smallest pile and so forth. I soon started picking all the large piles cuz i was looking for something to do. I always believed it wasn't that japanese people work really hard they just are expected to be visibly working an exordinate amount of time. Yes, you dodged a bullet lol. The life of a salary man is its own world 🌍 Really enjoy your content and TT etc. even tho i dont watch anime 😢. And i lived in Japan before Pokemon 😊

[@tokyo_taxi7835]

That's what I noticed too when I taught English in Japan. You're never really treated like a full employee, which I guess in my case it made sense, since my contract was on a yearly basis. But even so, I wasn't given my own laptop to work on, and I had to rely on my phone for internet access when I needed it. I was given very little actual work to do unless I could think up something on my own. I soon realized that, as long as I didn't make a fuss and kept quiet, I could read or study all day and no one would care, because really no one *did* care.

[@ufgatorbearify]

@@tokyo_taxi7835 were you bored? I was. Lol I taught at Nova Namba after salaryman days. It was well structured so I was never bored

[@tokyo_taxi7835]

@@ufgatorbearify Horrifically bored. XD

[@futuza]

​@@tokyo_taxi7835sounds like the perfect outlet to be doing a side business while you're at work 😂

[@Camiloken]

Same old same old. Japan was living in the 2000s in 1980s, and got stuck there since.

[@stevenmael]

Motivation and passion are absolutely essential for a productive worker, especially in the long run, take it from a burnt out and fed up programmer.

[@heroslippy6666]

That probably explains why open source software and linux have been on an upward trend in terms of users.

[@ChristopherCricketWallace]

​@@heroslippy6666Absolutely. Also, a non-trival amount of proprietary systems are still based on (or dependant on) open source--often free--projects. The majority of the framework we call "the Internet" was/is open source from mostly free labor. You nailed it. 1000%

[@nyankers]

​@@heroslippy6666 plus the main alternatives are Apple, a company that sells a vague sense of superiority, and Microsoft, a company that focuses on securing business contracts. Neither are primarily focused on technology.

[@futuza]

Yep, and, coding despite appearances, is a absolutely a creative outlet, if there's too much stress and not a healthy positive work life balance, it makes coders pretty bad at coding. What would have taken a happy, passionate, stress free coder 2 hours suddenly takes 2-3 days. Business are setting themselves to fail when they drive their software engineers into the ground with crunch, overtime, and high stress.

[@user-sc7fk5ys6x]

Long before Linux there was a similar project in Japan. As I recall it was an OS that was collectively developed and free for anyone to use in developing any project, whether commercial or hobbyist. Just didn’t have the baggage of the Cathedral Versus Bazaar culture wars as a backdrop, so it was less politicized. Anyone remember the name?

[@drkspider13]

All I can hear in my head is just an employer asking "what you don't like working all day and having no life outside of us? What's wrong with you?"

[@xvk2r8t0vxkne7]

Ever heard the term Hō-Ren-Sō 報 - 連 - 相? Apparently communication is also an issue. I don’t mean they suck at it. Quite the opposite. No, this mantra is what makes it very stressful. It’s a business practice on how you report to your superiors and colleagues. Managers make it such a huge deal that it eliminates motivation. Anything that goes against their moral compass will usually view it negatively. I sort of had experience with it, not in Japan but in a Japanese company in the US. Not much of an issue but I can feel where that practice atmosphere came from.

[@AManChoosesASlaveObeys]

And when you decide you can't take it anymore, you can't even talk about it since it would be considered slander or defamation. You have a job, you have to pretend to be content with it, you have to be the laughing stock of the company from times to times, you have to report like it was feudal japan and they will look wrong at you if you are divorced, have children with problems, talk too much, talk too little... no wonder nobody feels motivated.

[@Thanetos11]

I think what most businesses, big or small forget, is you are hiring adults. Most structure and rules are antiquated things to keep the employee in line and know their place. A lot of companies that treat their employees like adults get better results

[@Ace-ob9yk]

Just one fix - developers also need passion to create a software. If we are not motivated you can expect a heavy drop on productivity. I can't code anything if I don't feel motivated or the project I am does not feel interested. I believe all jobs, not just creative ones, need passion to deliver anything.

[@NuckElBerg]

Yea, I came here to say the same thing, which is kinda weird, considering Joey has a degree in Computer Design Technology.

[@piyushraj8109]

@@NuckElBerg I guess Joe just did since he had to do something but he is not invested in it

[@brett7y7]

It takes a lot of creativity to develop programs and it would be difficult to last long in such a profession without motivation.

[@lofijaponista585]

100%. We are literally writing it on a platform built for creatives - it requires tons of passion to create such software. Because as if anyone knew that in order to build an amazing software - you need to be the biggest user of your software. In other words have passion for content creation so big you decided to build a platform for it

[@badart3204]

The entire accounting industry looking at you like “passion”? The only passion in this industry is the bag

[@Rajin90]

Japan needs a paradigm shift, regarding work culture. It is no wonder the birth rate collapses, when people don't have the money, time and passion left to care about a family.

[@Mr.WestcottX]

For real. Declining birth rate 😢

[@NihonTiger584]

And your having a baby boom in the West? More like drug boom.

[@tacaloking4]

i think the two things that might result in this issue is one the hours worked and two if you look at how company's like sega and konami and how extremely determine to go the way they want and are completely unwilling to listen to suggestions or ideas

[@vickyoli]

I love going to Japan. It is a cool place, amazing food! but I would never live there. The work/life balance is the worst, and people in general are too into their own thing.

[@Mr.WestcottX]

For real.

[@jonahwillis2781]

A lot of of KZbinrs are able to bypass this by having unconventional jobs as journalists or content creators who aren’t tied to a Japanese company. But yeah unless you’re self-employed or an English teacher on visa, choosing to work and live in Japan is terrible for someone’s health

[@kasuboki]

As an intern programmer I can definitely tell you one thing. Your passion definitely influences the quality of your code 🧑‍💻

[@Taladar2003]

Agreed. And it influences how many new things you learn about that too which is so important in a fast moving field like programming.

[@thenonexistinghero]

I highly doubt that. Experience, knowledge and creativity are what influences the quality of your code. In fact, being passionate about your job just means you'll burn out faster. It being good for your job is just a delusional western thing that doesn't actually improve the quality of work. It'll just blind you because it'll be that much harder to abandon your train of thought when it turns out you've been wrong.

[@Taladar2003]

@@thenonexistinghero There is a difference between being passionate about your job and being invested in the product of your work to the point that you can not accept criticism. Always wanting to improve and learn new things about your job is part of being passionate about it. Not being passionate means e.g. not fixing a mistake or improving a workflow being nobody told you to.

[@thenonexistinghero]

@@Taladar2003 Complete nonsense. I have not been passionate about any job I ever did. I always did my best to learn things, took responsibility and fixed my mistakes. That's all part of the job, not my passion. It's always useful to learn new things.

[@bebeinjapan7434]

I think it may be cultural as japanese people are humble too. But I will say Japanese people (not all but all i have worked with and spoken too) that it is important to look busy, even if there is nothing to do. Many times we have had to come into work when we have had no electric, no internet. We could have gone home to do our work, but was told how could people (general population) trust us to do our work, they may think we are relaxing. So I was told we had to stay all day, most of my coworkers just slept at their desk or played games. I would say Japanese people have very low productivity, due to the micro-managing and honestly so many of them are finding it brain killing the lack of trust, lack of common sense and just the dismissal of change is destroying soul and workplace.

[@TheoCynical]

All they need is an opportunity, like the US did, of an opportunity to work remote and they too will see how ridiculous the working system is. The companies are just stubborn; not that their methods are currently optimally efficient.

[@thanosandnobill3789]

I know seven people in Japan all of them immigrants from different countries who have been living there for 7 years the least to 15 years the most and they tell me almost only positive things. Vietnamese, British, Greeks and an Italian, all of them very satisfied. According to their opinion, the reason is that they are willing to talk to their bosses and demand better salaries and benefits waaay more than their Japanese colleagues. The job satisfaction problem Japanese people have is almost all cultural not economic or political.

[@clarehidalgo]

Being able to self-advocate is an important skill for anyone

[@xanv8051]

Maybe all factors mentioned are why this happens

[@NihonTiger584]

LOL. Total BS. First the company has to sponsor the Visa. If they demand better, they are shown the door and kicked out of the country.

[@Rexhunterj]

Almost all those nationalaties come from places that are worse off than Japan currently. My vietnamese friend does everything he can to avoid being sent back to Nam, he said its a dead end country, living there gave him no hope of any kind of future.

[@NihonTiger584]

Really? I dont see any japanese trying to get into Europe and the US. And when the border was closed the white people were screaming the loudest. @@Rexhunterj

[@MayDay14000]

Me: *Looks at description* Also me: I’ve got so many good products from Japan. I wouldn’t think they’re the worst workers. They should be paid more than what they’re currently earning, too.🤔🙂🇯🇵

[@irisdawnmiranda7808]

Most people there say it's just not the money alone. it's the work culture itself. You have number of leaves but you can't take them as you will be frowned upon by your co-workers, even your boss. You have to stay even though you're done with your job for the day, waiting for your boss to be done for the day too. The seniority system is still very strong, so promotion can get really difficult, despite being qualified for it. Despite having a higher percentage of women working, there's still exist sexism in the workplace as well. Yes, several of these also happen in other parts of the world, but Japan grips real tight on the values of self-sacrifice and dedication that these are demanded greatly on their workers.

[@mycrochetlifeanime]

thank you joey for todays video

[@LatinDimpling]

Joey The Japan man. thank you for keeping us updated o7

[@potato8236]

I really considered working in japan after I did a semester abroad doing research, but having had a great professor that didn't give shit about societal norms and customs which made it one of the most enjoyable times of my life, I didn't really consider what Japan outside of that bubble was like. When I learned that you start out with only 10 paid days of per year and no paid sick leave, I honestly turned around. Firstly I would earn way less in software development than I would in europe, and secondly, when taking sick time and just time for yourself to not burn out, I'd pretty much have less than half the money that I'd earn normally in europe. I still have a couple of japanese friends and most of them with fulltime jobs are miserable, two of them already left japan because work abroad for a university graduate is simply worth much more.

[@Taladar2003]

You can see how deluded managers and business owners are in other countries too e.g. in the home office / return to office debates. They have no idea what motivates their workers or what the workers even do or which ones are actually productive.

[@jacobdrolet4262]

Amazing video Joey of the studies of Japanese people in Japan society,fantastic job.

[@johnnypollack3243]

Keep up the awesome work and videos Joey love the video

[@Kmzhr]

It’s kind of notorious for anyone who lived here some time (and it’s a good observer) that the Japanese work system is very flawed, in so many levels. Their inefficiency towards tasks that should be simple, they like to make into a complicated procedure. And the old culture of “having to go for a drink” with your boss and coworkers is just terrible.

[@futuza]

I work in an American organization and we also do the dinner/drinking with boss,/coworkers, but it's optional and you get paid on the clock if you join in and the organization pays for all the food/drinks. It also happens way less often, like maybe 8-10 times a year. Much better way of doing it.

[@jenniferhanses]

Based on various studies conducted over nearly a century now, the ideal work day is about 6 hours. Your employees will come in, get their work done, and go home, stopping possibly for lunch with coworkers. A 6 hour day provides them with adequate time to care for their families. And they will be productive in that time, and not waste your electricity and time watching videos on youtube. If we designed, say, a 10 hour work day with a morning shift of early risers who start work at 7 and leave at 2, and an evening shift who starts work at 11 and leaves at 5, you would probably have the most productive situation with an overlap of 2 hours plus the lunch hour for people to interface with everyone at the company. But companies don't think like that and think longer hours at work is better.

[@redridingcape]

That model of work doesn't include other costs of employees, like how it takes time and money to train them. I'm guessing that the reason you don't see much of 6 hour workdays is because it's more efficient for the company to have less employees work longer hours to get the work done than to train more employees to work less hours to get the work done.

[@jenniferhanses]

@@redridingcape At this point, there's not really much training. That's part of the reason wages have been depressed. Jobs that used to pay more because of specialized knowledge no longer require that knowledge or skill, and workers are viewed of replaceable. Part of the reason we don't have 6 hour work days is tradition. I mean everyone is doing it, it's what everyone expects. So that's what we do. A lot of it is also managers not keeping up with the studies because this is old news. And much of it is really blind greed. Basically, you have to spend money to make money. It would actually be in the favor of huge companies to pay their employees more, for example. Because then the employees wouls spend more, and they'd get even more money back. That's how the Ford Motor Company was built, for example. They paid extremely high wages when they could have paid much less, and ended up forcing their competitors to do so as well. And Ford made money hand over fist. Just insane levels of money. But they don't understand that. They think they need to cut expenses and sit on top of their piles of gold like dragons Most of the people in charge of these thigns don't actually understand them. .

[@redridingcape]

@@jenniferhanses I think you're underestimating the people in charge of decision making at these companies, and overestimating yourself. If the strategies you are endorsing were so generally powerful, then at least 1 company would likely be using them or have used them. You yourself could start a company and use those strategies, if you could get the capital and knowledge of the other things needed to start a business then if your theories are correct you would be able to dominate the market and force other companies to adapt to you. I think it's far more likely that there are factors that you aren't considering as to why your strategies aren't generally the most efficient.

[@InazumaDash]

I'd rather live in a shed made out of cardboard than STAY after work and do exactly what? I don't drink and would rather save my money than using it on eating out.

[@thebrotatochip5469]

Cool video, do more of these about the state of Japan, I think you have been but I you don't get in my feed that much.

[@lordkanti8260]

I find it telling that people can’t see that a work culture also faces burnout. So that’s what’s happening in Japan. The only thing that can save them is a personal expression of discovery. Corporations always kills the personal identity of its employees. Expression of identity is the only way for this particular issue. Ps; I’d say the only reason Americans work harder and are more passionate is because they will do no more then what they’re paid for. They’ll quit the moment you impede on their time and title. You can’t mess with American employees cause Americans have already had the labor laws and protests to protect employees legally

[@cheesemuffin8129]

Expression of identity? Sure, OR they could just work less than 80 hours a week.

[@futuza]

​@@cheesemuffin8129doing that allows them to express identity. If they only work 40 hours a week, they suddenly have a whole bunch of time for self-expression and discovery.

[@jae4ze]

US person here, I can say that every other American I've met who isn't an insane person or over the age of 50 hates everything about their job or almost everything about it and feels stuck or hopeless about said job. Work is work, you clock in do what you have to and clock out just for the pay check, because otherwise you risk literally losing it all. Especially right now when so many people are struggling to find jobs or move up to better positions within their work environment, i 100% believe that the US citizens in the survey results lied, there's so much performative positivity and hiding your struggles here. We also don't know the demographics for the survey either, so it could be a bumch of wealthy people who consider themselves extremely motivated and hard working, I don't know. Being an employee just fucking sucks in general for most people I've met.

[@Arfurful]

Great vid joey

[@s3s_]

@13:56 lol bro you sounded like Kyle kulinsky with that "DAWG" 😂😂

[@n1hondude]

I've been saying this for years but here it is again: West vs East Individual vs Collective I always put two countries each extreme as an example, USA and Japan IDEALLY they should both be in the middle but true balance is impossible so they each should move 15% towards the middle. If Murca cared more about others and the community, then there wouldn't be so many karens, so many selfish snowflakes, they'd line up properly and respect the rules, which is so baffling to think they consider Japan as "respectful" just because they stand in line, those are just BASIC MANNERS Similarly, if Japan cared more about its people rather than "preserving the peace" they would start teaching that standing out is NOT a bad thing and they would instead teach WHEN to stand out such as at work: Feeling stressed? No need to suicide, just quit, eff the company that doesn't care about you Too much work? Just quit or go on vacation instead of literally dying from overwork Being bullied? You'll definitely talk to HR or report to the police Tired? Take ALL of your vacation days and don't do your pointless "overtime" just sitting around At a meeting and the boss said something stupid? Speak up and call him on his bs (in a respectful way), eff the hierachry, productivity is more important in this case By also not working as much they'd have more time to go eff around, quite literally, and make more babies, also cheating less theoretically speaking It's as simple as that.

[@YuutaTogashi0707]

It's like there is no balance for anything Politics for example It's like everyone is hard one side or the other

[@xjakanton2576]

@@YuutaTogashi0707 I actually think that is due to the internet connecting people into bigger groups than would have been possible without it. We had many medium-sized groups ( which helped with diversifying views), but over time they merged in bigger factions.

[@Pfromm007]

​@YuutaTogashi0707 You're absolutely right. In the US, It's important to note that all mass media is controlled by the same rich few who pay political parties the big money. They have a vested interest in creating as much extreme polarization as possible, because anger makes people more easily controllable. It divides people, which maintains control over them and maintains the status quo.

[@greg.peepeeface]

As a Japanese American having lived in the Bay Area and Los Angeles for the last 24 years, I have dated and have Japanese friends. The ones in Japan have the most ridiculous work schedules, like my ex who was a patisserie, and I couldn't fathrom her work schedule which was like a 14-16 hours day, and she would only sleep 4-6 hour a day. The way I see it, it's a lot of SHOW versus being effective like show that you can be at work for 12-14 hours a day (people pleaser face), whereas some other worker in Korea, the US, do the same work in a 1/3rd or half the time.. the biggest proof is that the vast majority of Japanese companies do not out perform companies globally.

[@lareolanKFP]

Hey! Writing code all day is quite exciting! I don't know how many devs you know, but most devs are very passionate about their code.

[@chrishoff402]

The thing about work surveys, or surveys in general, I recommend avoiding them if at all possible. You might think results are anonymous when they're not, and they can have loaded questions in them that can be used back against people.

[@jameslewis2635]

Being able to have a night out with your workmates once in a while can help with team cohesion and general morale. However the stereotype I get is that this is expected to happen after pretty much every work night. That is way too much to be viable and is only going to encourage a workplace full of people who are sick of each other and probably have liver problems. Once a month or once a quarter would be a much more balanced way of handling this. In the UK this pretty much only happens at Christmas parties or if there is some special event that the company is signed up for.

[@Mady-lo6qb]

Same. Christmas. Large companies might have sports days mid year. Otherwise, smaller units might have a birthday club with cake and ice cream during working hours if you are in a back office.

[@LikeAFemaleDog]

I feel like the survey in itself was flawed by the nature of the questions themselves. Someone may very well be very passionate on what they do for work, but may still hate it due to outside factors, for example, someone who works in the gaming industry may love making games, but hates how they have to listen to their higher up's decisions, and live in constant fear of being laid off. On a situation such as that one, what would you answer towards the question: "Are you passionate about your work/ or work conditions?" Depending on how you interpret the question, to what you put more emphasis in, your answer will differ. So, without knowing how they did it, I can see how the results could be skewed.

[@markwatson8714]

Well, the first question would be whether they're actually looking at the right thing, or if it's the usual HR corpo drone nonsense where they're expecting people who are literally only working a job to get them through college to be 'passionate' about the role. Since obviously the medical degree is just a hobby, and what you really want to dedicate the rest of your life to is flipping burgers ...

[@alexdavis3848]

Another layer is that many companies have internal "anonymous" surveys on employees happiness once a year. It asks questions about feeling supported, how good the moss is, work life balance, etc. And I mark everything with the highest score even if I don't want to put of fear of it being used to sack me from a job I genuinely like and need. I feel these surveys, specifically the ones at my job, are to see who they should let go. And by who I mean anyone who doesn't rate their experience high or has genuine feedback out of care.

[@angiriberdy5094]

More than anything, I think this has a way of showing how different countries view employment. Two countries could be doing the exact same work with the exact same output, but could score completely different based on the culture and work ethic inherent to the people within. It may be a metric of how the people in the company feel at this moment, but it's only one of many metrics. If your society tells you work should be like a second family, that may not be reflected in a survey like this, but could affect the overall feeling of satisfaction the employee would have in relation to their job. However, if the society around an employee puts more emphasis on something like output or growth, that employee could feel very different towards their job and reflect as much on a survey like this. More than anything, this can be an amazing baseline of research over employee feelings in certain regions over years or even decades. Not so much comparing everyone to these others involved, but having an amazing database of feelings of satisfaction and completion to local social norms that ebb and flow over time. You can watch how countries, or regions of a larger business, flex in time to meet (or not) employee needs as businesses continue on.

[@ChannelSho]

A few thoughts - Not changing work culture is probably rooted in the (probably older) owners thinking "well if my business has been around for X number of years, clearly I'm doing something right." To some extent, sure there's probably something they're doing right that's keeping their business alive. But probably not the work culture. - The people who are arguing against this study may have anecdotal bias. They just happened to be in the right place at the right time. Of course, you could question the pool of people the study looked at, but I like to think they did a more or less random selection. - Regarding the "who would you hire?" question, if I had no other choice, I'd rather take someone who has a good personality. You can always teach skill. You can't teach personality.

[@MrBthomp]

Great hate employers who want to treat their employees like family. I want to be treated like a professional and paid like it. People require purpose, respect and compensation for their labor. When you say I call them like family, all you're doing is stripping those three things and replacing it with obligation.

[@daviddavid5880]

I work for a Japanese-run factory in the US. You know what you get for working 66hr workweeks for years? They graciously allow you to keep doing it until you die or are replaced by a robot. Purgatory, but with stability.

[@Mark3h]

Amazing that japan seemingly refuse to aknowledge that their work culture is also a huge factor of their population decline. Most households now require 2 incomes and the work culture of doing overtime until late evening or totally not forced socilizing after work is entirely anti-family. Younger people literally do not have the time or the financial situation to start a family.

[@daaz4459]

You have a platform that can really connect and bring some shade of empathy from the world to Japan's reality (and more). But for that please try not to be superficial with your commentary or your videos' ideas. I love your content and would really enjoy to see more content that actually depicts conversations, images, film and other stuff about Japan, trying to SHOW us the situation in Japan along with your comments on it. I know it can be challenging for you to try new things from a suggestion of mine, specially since I'm just a viewer and I'm sure you've thought about this. Anyways I know that you have the ideas and the capacity to find a great way to bring Japan's reality to YT. Keep up the great work!

[@meteor22]

It's gotta be really annoying to be more or less forced to go out drinking with your boss who does far less work than you and gets paid more.

[@aclady2295]

You’re a good boss Joey. I met several managers who need your perspective and mentality towards your employees.

[@schnitzel_enjoyer]

An Indian KZbin vlogger also pointed the Japanese technological knowledge is very outdated, he once had to train some interns at his IT firm who didn't know what a VPN was. Also office politics are really bad there and they judge people a lot.

[@Raptor850]

As a programmer I can say that motivation is very important if you want to do the job well. Programming requires a lot of creativity and if you do things just to get by, you will end up with mediocre and inefficient code.

[@futuza]

Or you just end up in a staring contest with a function header for 3 hours, and what should have taken 3 hours ends up taking 3 days.

[@MADAOSushi]

man. I'm in the US and actually in a situation where the micromanaging is borderline abusive. With statements such as "you're replaceable!" being thrown out there. I was also told we were purposely given uncomfortable chairs so that it would force us to get up to move around more, potentially to clean or something. Lots of ridiculous stuff, I can feel old mental health issues rearing it's ugly head but, I'm able to hang in there. I wonder how common this is in general or if overall work vs life balance is declining as the years have been passing by.

[@Saberdud]

bro quit, what are you doing

[@MADAOSushi]

@@Saberdud Trust me when I say there is a loooot of things going on keeping me here. I won't go into too much detail but, I'm putting in the work because I'm essentially running the business alone and have a following within the business. I'd leave if I didn't not have an investment opportunity to purchase the business. If it doesn't go through I won't even stick around for a few more months.

[@Takayama-sama]

I used to want to live in Japan, but I honestly do not think I could handle the Japanese work culture. The whole drinks after work thing for example. I don’t want to drink every night. I have to wake up early the next day to get ready for work. It makes absolutely no sense to stay out late the night before drinking with my boss. I’d rather leave work on time and get a good nights rest so I can do my job the next day without feeling like a zombie. Isn’t that just common sense? I don’t know…

[@jonnythunder92]

Random question: What are the glasses frames you are wearing? They are on point and I’m in the market for a new pair of reading specs. Very nice.

[@SanyouRuki]

Pretty sure this shit happens everywhere to varying degrees. For example, over here in Germany, they keep complaining about people not returning from part time to full time. Most blame it on the financial aspect, and happily overlook the time aspect. Same goes for home office. Despite many studies proving how less rigid work times improve productivity. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[@janina3879]

Recently seen a video on Japanese economics which described Japan as being stuck in the year 2000 since the 1970th. Of course it's a very simplified summary.. but it certainly feels that way sometimes.

[@yunlisa2243]

Bruh, that is so weird!! In the America, I heard similar terrifying stories!! It’s super awkward to be friends or go out with bosses and co workers!! I was shocked to hear that some places, you have to “ BE FRIENDS” with coworkers or bosses outside of the company’s working hours! Are you kidding me?!? Working in stressful job in the company is more than enough yet these CEO wants separate relationship outside!! They’re out of their minds!! Employees has their own private life too you know!, just because they’re working, bosses has no right to strip away their private life like that! It’s freaking weird! I can’t imagine getting a call from a coworker outside of my working time just to hang out or talk. NO!! Keep these two things separate please!! Work and personal space should be separated not privileged!!

[@rick3421]

Realy good video

[@doomguy-senpai1901]

Japan is very gerontocratic which makes change in government and Business hard as old people are less likely to adapt to change and new ideas. I just hope Japan will find a way to reform their government and work culture same for Korea.

[@Fr00stee]

korea is fucked. Their "solution" is to make a government sponsored dating event and blaming feminism, none of which will fix the core issues facing korea

[@shwars576]

Damn that japanese man is on that good shit, wish I could cope like that

[@nivenreed5118]

I barely look at these types of articles because just from what he was talking about they literally compared the rest of the world with japan of course theyre gonna be different and the whole thing with people losing passion for work that can really be fixed by how an employee is treated, its literally just treating someone the way you want to be treated. I dont get we will teach our kids this hell we will drill this into kids heads but the moment you step into adult hood it goes right out the window, now I'm not very educated about alot of what happens in japan I've been trying to look more into the culture to show respect because i want to go there one day but work culture in general need to change as a whole. ( I had this all thought out but just went out the window sorry if its very disconjointed).

[@Ashley-xu1lk]

Even if a job does not require passion to get decent results, passion is needed for job satisfaction. Not the only thing, but it is a factor. I think this argument got off track with the passion question, the point of these surveys seem to be "Are you satisfied with your job? Do you like working at your company doing what you're doing now?" I don't necessarily need passion to do my job, but the day certainly goes by faster and is overall more enjoyable when I'm actually enjoying my current tasking and the people around me aren't zombies waiting to collapse from mental and physical exhaustion.

[@desantemeh2122]

i work in a company which is located in many places in the world. every year we are asked to complete standard summaries. it's kinda a normal usa mentality for them to give better results whan how they REALLY think. if you wanna answer good you have to take one of the best answers where a "good" option is a middle for us. top answers are "wow, amazing, wonderful, cannot be better" so in reality we bearly never use them. so even though not true i totally see why usa scores so high, same as when you ask someone "how are you?" and you cannot be truthful about it, have to go with standard "great! and you?" which also btw makes no sense in my country. when we are asked "how are you?" we usualy assume it's because you are interested in our life. so to say: if the study just asks these questions then it's not really viable

[@cacaulaymulkin7724]

There's no reason to bs in an anonymous study though

[@johnrhogan2908]

It's great that Joey's very passionate about his brand, Nonsense. :)

[@jaspervaneck3258]

11:30 Equating programing and "punching in numbers" is certainly a take...

[@iiraingirlii]

2:30 We have this too here in Austria 😞

[@silkvelvet2616]

If you pose the questions in the right way, and restrict those questions to a specific set of people, you can get any result you darned well want. Even when canvassing random people on the street, the results can be manipulated. If you restrict answers to a, b, c or d, you can control the results because people are forced to choose what answer is closest to their truth. If those surveyors had gone and asked a bunch of artisans how they feel about what they do, the results in each country would be massively different. So regardless of the results, don't bother taking them seriously until you look at who and how they posed the survey to get the results they are claiming.

[@heroslippy6666]

Ayyy this person knows how surveys work.

[@Saberdud]

Ayyy this person knows how surveys work.

[@YrCleddyf]

I hate parties in general so I'm glad in the UK we don't have to go to work parties and the like

[@Alkaris]

I would agree that being stuck doing the same old ways of doing things is just setting up yourself for failure in the future, and that you have adapt and make changes as you go where it's necessary. I would imagine that this disdain for the current working conditions in Japan are coming from younger generation of people who see it's not a great work environment, and still working on an old and dated system from however many years ago they first implemented this kind of work ethics. To be expected to hangout with your boss and co-workers at the end of the day is putting a lot of pressure on that other individual, y' know? Maybe they really don't want to do that sort of stuff every day or week, however many time they do that stuff, like sure social gatherings can be nice, but maybe you just want to head home because you're stressed and tired and just want to kick back and relax yourself, instead of having this expectation to turn up to social gatherings. You could probably also say the same about overdoing schooling with cram schools, you study for most of the entire day, and then having more school classes after that late into the evening, overworking your brain will make it that much harder for you to retain that information, because there's a fine balance of studying plenty, but not overdoing it where it takes all your focus and energy, and who's to say your qualifications after doing courses is going to land you a job immediately after and you could be potentially wasting your time and effort as you may not be able to get a job at all with all your acquired qualifications.

[@Mady-lo6qb]

I never stayed up late to study. I was ashamed to say so to my school friends because they all bragged about how many hours they spent studying at night (this was only as exams were coming up). I tried to be like them and do this but my brain would crash and burn and I would be staring at the same page for an hour. Nevertheless, I was still top of the class. Probably because I am terrible at rote memorizing. I prefer to understand the topic. And if you are studying for hours, then I expect that the majority of the time is doing rote memorizing. As an example, when in primary school, the teacher would go around and quiz us on the times table. I hated it and was completely stressed out. But who was tops in arithmetic? Me. lol.

[@t.b.m.5718]

It's almost as if stressful work conditions promoted by draconian work culture is bad for productivity. You can definitely over micromanage, to the point where your workers feel like robots. We are very good at organizing work patterns but awful at sustaining those same patterns over time, while leaders pay little attention to evolution of the work place.

[@SjurgisS]

IDK - Nintendo pretty passionate on sue'ing everyone they can :D

[@philbertius]

As a game programmer I’m a little offended, I’m pretty damn passionate, but I get your point 😂

[@lacusrengoku5087]

I must admit, from the perspective of a psychotherapist, this is a deeply insightful survey. Thanks for sharing, Joey!!

[@shadowgirl11]

That is a good point about the public face bit. My granny really pushed me to be someone who was super polite and care a lot about how others think. It made me so depressed and made my self identity really unstable.

[@sweatedtrash1743]

I work as a Supervisor at a US company that has decent culture (I only speak for my department, which is IT). Leaders or 'owners' in a company are extremely important. It is your responsibility to ensure you are meeting someone's goals, seeing where you can push them, and where to provide more support (like Joey said, treating them like people). Also advocating for your people when you can. Additionally, always challenging the status quo and asking 'why' is a huge part of why I like the culture where I work. It adds creativity for solutions and I like playing 'devils advocate'. I am excited to hear more about Joey's experiences in starting his own business! Being a leader is hard, but rewarding :)

[@somebodythatiusetoknow2027]

Honestly Japanese are hard working ppl, include increase wages and better work/life balance

[@Tinkbook]

I've worked for many years in child related businesses (dance schools, gymnastics, after school care, sport clubs...) I find it very interesting that all these have their own version of tatemae, we referred to it as putting on your 'Disney Face'

[@marknicoll7034]

I've been having more and more of a problem with the cult of passion that's been going through the business world. I don't use the word cult lightly. The fact that it seems to be international is also a problem. In general I find passion is the result of good leadership and as long as you have good leaders then passion is something that comes to you. It seems like in the modern business realm our leaders are just really bad and are instead expecting their employees to be the leaders as those who should be leaders act more as rule enforcers and red tapers. Think about this in an army context. If your commanders suck then your soldiers wont listen but if your commanders are good then your soldiers will literally die for you. I don't know why in the business world it would be the opposite.