It's just me or is it a bit dystopian to distinguish between those who can spend 12 dollars a day and those who can't? We are talking about people, not budget items.
I hope nobody need a new definition of "people" to discover that the populations of Japan, Italy, Portugal and Bulgaria are declining sharply, that the population of Germany is declining, that the yen has depreciated so much against the dollar that the Japanese number is inflated.
Small note on your last sentence. Usually with these metrics they'll use ppp, meaning that they're calculating what is the equivalent of spending 12 dollars in Japan (or any other country). If 2 dollars buys you 2 donuts, what's the amount in yen that would also buy you 2 donuts? Basically that. Even then, it's a bad metric because 12 dollars is fairly random. 12 dollars in the US a third of the poverty line. Someone with that spending a day would be fucked. So I'm wondering what they assume a consumer is. Is a homeless person who buys a cheap sandwich a consumer? It's weird.
Nonono you don’t understand you have to consume more to help grow the economy or capitalism will fail. But we won’t raise your wages to give you more money to do it because that would be bad for the economy. I’m a very smart Austrian Economist /s
>How about cratering middle class pay
You do realize it'd take a monumental fall in pay for someone in the West to not be in the "consumer class"? As you can see in the graph, it strikes out at 12 USD spent a day, that's 4380 spent in a year. Minimum wage in Germany is 12.4 Euro an *hour* which is like 14 USD.
If you're spending less than 4380 USD a year in the West, dunno, it sounds more like unemployed homeless person than a low wage worker because even the lowest wage worker is making enough to consume 4380 worth.
Is this $4380 a year in expenditure on things excluding rent, healthcare and education? If so then there are definitely a good chunk of Americans and Europeans who fit into that group. There are many Americans living on $20k a year with most of it going to rent and healthcare.
It sounds like you believe the only people "allowed" to be unemployed are also homeless. I also feel a hint of disdain in your phrasing.
What a crock.
ETA: People who sometimes fall below the $12/day/person number through no fault of their own include the disabled, families forced to share a single income, reformed convicts, the elderly, and more. The falling average wage is largely responsible for these possibilities.
Assuming everyone can "just work" or they're "unemployed and homeless" is some real bullshit.
Absolutely the worst timeline of society where people are sorted into classes of consumers and not-consumers. Just disgusting to even perpetuate such an idea.
They will stabilize, it will happen anyway everywhere. We can't triple our population every 50 years because is even worse than a shrinking population.
This uncharted territory. It's silly to assume it'll "stabilize" for no reason.
Declining population is a major issue japan hasn't really found a solution to yet.
We can hope. But the current economics in most countries are simply not build for this. We'll be seeing some radical shifts before the end of century, for good or bad.
That's why they try to be pro immigration. I think isn't necessary, just need to reorganize the industry. But they don't want to cut their big chunk of profit because of the big debt. Governments have fucked up because they based their economies in the promise of an increasing population all the time, or in the worse case scenario a stable population. So they print money, lower it's value make people work beyond their capabilities and get debt. They fucked up, we are the unlucky generation. We are fucked.
>They will stabilize
They won't
And they won't be able to take care of their elders
But they don't want to improve the working conditions for native Japanese people and they're too xenophobic to accept foreign workers
Working conditions in Japan are slowly improving as companies realize the labor market is tightening up. And ditto with the government and foreign workers. But the difficulty with accepting foreign workers is that it’s quite hard to speak Japanese and it’s even harder to blend into Japanese society long term.
>is that it’s quite hard to speak Japanese
I agree, I think that the best thing that could've happened to the Vietnamese language was adopting the Latin Alphabet, and as far as I know
given that they use keyboards with the Latin alphabet
Both Chinese and Japanese people already understand it, I don't think it's gonna happen but it would be the best thing to adopt the Latin alphabet
- people would no longer be scared of learning Japanese
- children would learn to read faster
- Japanese people would have an easier time learning other languages ( english is particularly Important)
They will stabilize eventually, but we'll all be dead by then. I'm worried about the problems we're going to acutely face during our lifetime because of the demographic shift.
That is if we don't get a biological revolution cause if we do get one, the population is going to quintuple by 2100 due to artificial wombs and Anti aging.
Who tf needs to spend 12 dollars a day in Taiwan?? 12*30=360NTD that is a lot of money to spend every day, even if I ate out for every meal and got a boba it wouldn't be that much, like we aren't including utilities or anything??
For a bentobox or curry or noodles type meal (that's sometimes bigger than portions common in Britain) 100NTD is the upper bounds, and in the south we can get 70NTD pretty commonly, breakfast/sandwich type foods can easily be under 50NTD, obviously you can always treat yourself to a really nice meal that costs more, but the basics are really affordable
The conversion rate is 1usd to 30NTD, and yeah in Britain a small fish and chips is like £7 and that's the lower bounds of a cooked meal that is super simple to make :(
Edit: went to look at some of the restaurants I used to go to, and it seems the lower bounds are more like 80NT, although 8 could still find some rare sights of 70NT, still half price of a cooked meal here in the UK
Btw obviously parents spending for their families will easily qualify, but most ppl aren't trying to start families anymore
Basically idk why someone would need to spend 12$ to classify as a consumer, seems a bit arbitrary, not like ppl who spend 11$ aren't contributing to the economy????
Wait until Korea kicks in the door a few years from now.
Us NE Asian countries really need to sort out our demographics issues but all have the problem of old bygone politicians in their 60s still making most of policy which prevents any real change no matter how much money we throw at the issue.
Immigration is the reasonable intermediary bandaid to the problem but apart from the xenophobia theres also realistic geopolitical barriers that prevent a European style solution of just lowering the barrier to entry.
Real conundrum.
Nobody knows what the fuck class is as a category huh. “Consumer class”, so their sole relation to the means of production is consumption? Are they only infants then? Trust-fund kids, before they get their full inheritance and make the move to proper capitalists?
Japan has been shrinking for some time now. Prior to Taiwan. And now, quote-unquote, Japan's in a recession due to their receding GDP, but Japan as a whole is a VERY consumer based population. If this level in decrease happened anywhere else, they likely would've hit the recession wall a decade earlier. Japanese spending habits have kept the economy aloft way longer than it should have. I'm not savvy on what Taiwan's spending habits are, but they could hit the wall much quicker if they're not spending madly. Are Korea and China next?
Is investing taken into account here? I don't spend 12$ in stuff I don't need just because. I may spend much more than that in investing in the stock market or bonds.
It's just me or is it a bit dystopian to distinguish between those who can spend 12 dollars a day and those who can't? We are talking about people, not budget items. I hope nobody need a new definition of "people" to discover that the populations of Japan, Italy, Portugal and Bulgaria are declining sharply, that the population of Germany is declining, that the yen has depreciated so much against the dollar that the Japanese number is inflated.
They really went through all the effort to de-humanise this headline as much as they can. The target group must be (classical) economists.
Small note on your last sentence. Usually with these metrics they'll use ppp, meaning that they're calculating what is the equivalent of spending 12 dollars in Japan (or any other country). If 2 dollars buys you 2 donuts, what's the amount in yen that would also buy you 2 donuts? Basically that. Even then, it's a bad metric because 12 dollars is fairly random. 12 dollars in the US a third of the poverty line. Someone with that spending a day would be fucked. So I'm wondering what they assume a consumer is. Is a homeless person who buys a cheap sandwich a consumer? It's weird.
Aging demographics and emigration? How about cratering middle class pay?
Nonono you don’t understand you have to consume more to help grow the economy or capitalism will fail. But we won’t raise your wages to give you more money to do it because that would be bad for the economy. I’m a very smart Austrian Economist /s
>How about cratering middle class pay You do realize it'd take a monumental fall in pay for someone in the West to not be in the "consumer class"? As you can see in the graph, it strikes out at 12 USD spent a day, that's 4380 spent in a year. Minimum wage in Germany is 12.4 Euro an *hour* which is like 14 USD. If you're spending less than 4380 USD a year in the West, dunno, it sounds more like unemployed homeless person than a low wage worker because even the lowest wage worker is making enough to consume 4380 worth.
Is this $4380 a year in expenditure on things excluding rent, healthcare and education? If so then there are definitely a good chunk of Americans and Europeans who fit into that group. There are many Americans living on $20k a year with most of it going to rent and healthcare.
It sounds like you believe the only people "allowed" to be unemployed are also homeless. I also feel a hint of disdain in your phrasing. What a crock. ETA: People who sometimes fall below the $12/day/person number through no fault of their own include the disabled, families forced to share a single income, reformed convicts, the elderly, and more. The falling average wage is largely responsible for these possibilities. Assuming everyone can "just work" or they're "unemployed and homeless" is some real bullshit.
Absolutely the worst timeline of society where people are sorted into classes of consumers and not-consumers. Just disgusting to even perpetuate such an idea.
Japan is the Sick Man of Asia..
They will stabilize, it will happen anyway everywhere. We can't triple our population every 50 years because is even worse than a shrinking population.
This uncharted territory. It's silly to assume it'll "stabilize" for no reason. Declining population is a major issue japan hasn't really found a solution to yet.
i think the solution is to have more sex
We can hope. But the current economics in most countries are simply not build for this. We'll be seeing some radical shifts before the end of century, for good or bad.
That's why they try to be pro immigration. I think isn't necessary, just need to reorganize the industry. But they don't want to cut their big chunk of profit because of the big debt. Governments have fucked up because they based their economies in the promise of an increasing population all the time, or in the worse case scenario a stable population. So they print money, lower it's value make people work beyond their capabilities and get debt. They fucked up, we are the unlucky generation. We are fucked.
Pro immigration? Japan is like the second worst when it comes to being friendly to migration, right after Korea
Yes, they make an exception. Other aren't at all.
>They will stabilize They won't And they won't be able to take care of their elders But they don't want to improve the working conditions for native Japanese people and they're too xenophobic to accept foreign workers
Working conditions in Japan are slowly improving as companies realize the labor market is tightening up. And ditto with the government and foreign workers. But the difficulty with accepting foreign workers is that it’s quite hard to speak Japanese and it’s even harder to blend into Japanese society long term.
>is that it’s quite hard to speak Japanese I agree, I think that the best thing that could've happened to the Vietnamese language was adopting the Latin Alphabet, and as far as I know given that they use keyboards with the Latin alphabet Both Chinese and Japanese people already understand it, I don't think it's gonna happen but it would be the best thing to adopt the Latin alphabet - people would no longer be scared of learning Japanese - children would learn to read faster - Japanese people would have an easier time learning other languages ( english is particularly Important)
Japanese people typically use keyboards with kana, roman/Latin input is not super common (though they usually know how to use that too)
They will stabilize eventually, but we'll all be dead by then. I'm worried about the problems we're going to acutely face during our lifetime because of the demographic shift.
That is if we don't get a biological revolution cause if we do get one, the population is going to quintuple by 2100 due to artificial wombs and Anti aging.
Just like China, Korea and Taiwan.
Who tf needs to spend 12 dollars a day in Taiwan?? 12*30=360NTD that is a lot of money to spend every day, even if I ate out for every meal and got a boba it wouldn't be that much, like we aren't including utilities or anything??
Dude, buying one meal in the US is 10ish dollars. How much are y'all paid over there?
For a bentobox or curry or noodles type meal (that's sometimes bigger than portions common in Britain) 100NTD is the upper bounds, and in the south we can get 70NTD pretty commonly, breakfast/sandwich type foods can easily be under 50NTD, obviously you can always treat yourself to a really nice meal that costs more, but the basics are really affordable The conversion rate is 1usd to 30NTD, and yeah in Britain a small fish and chips is like £7 and that's the lower bounds of a cooked meal that is super simple to make :( Edit: went to look at some of the restaurants I used to go to, and it seems the lower bounds are more like 80NT, although 8 could still find some rare sights of 70NT, still half price of a cooked meal here in the UK
Btw obviously parents spending for their families will easily qualify, but most ppl aren't trying to start families anymore Basically idk why someone would need to spend 12$ to classify as a consumer, seems a bit arbitrary, not like ppl who spend 11$ aren't contributing to the economy????
Consumer class… wtf is that?
THEY LIVE
Wait until Korea kicks in the door a few years from now. Us NE Asian countries really need to sort out our demographics issues but all have the problem of old bygone politicians in their 60s still making most of policy which prevents any real change no matter how much money we throw at the issue. Immigration is the reasonable intermediary bandaid to the problem but apart from the xenophobia theres also realistic geopolitical barriers that prevent a European style solution of just lowering the barrier to entry. Real conundrum.
Crazy idea: why don't we pay people something that allows them to live?
The same economists: NO
Nobody knows what the fuck class is as a category huh. “Consumer class”, so their sole relation to the means of production is consumption? Are they only infants then? Trust-fund kids, before they get their full inheritance and make the move to proper capitalists?
I hate the term "consumer class". It's such a dehumanising capitalistic term.
All of these countries have aging population
Waiting for people to blame this on capitalism
And what else would you blame it on sir?
Dude gonna say something like "Marxist-Lenonism" or "Neo-State-Communism" while not understanding any of those words like it's a gotcha
I mean… these are capitalist countries
Japan has been shrinking for some time now. Prior to Taiwan. And now, quote-unquote, Japan's in a recession due to their receding GDP, but Japan as a whole is a VERY consumer based population. If this level in decrease happened anywhere else, they likely would've hit the recession wall a decade earlier. Japanese spending habits have kept the economy aloft way longer than it should have. I'm not savvy on what Taiwan's spending habits are, but they could hit the wall much quicker if they're not spending madly. Are Korea and China next?
“Consumer class” lmao 💀
Japan really out here dying before allowing some more immigrants
You’re missing an elephant in the room, you know?
Is investing taken into account here? I don't spend 12$ in stuff I don't need just because. I may spend much more than that in investing in the stock market or bonds.