I was quite stunted looking at the headline on the newspaper today showing some sample stories of people around 25-35 in japan. (I tried to translate it)

<<Japan under the crisis>>
Under the impact of the financial crisis and the strong YEN dollar, the export is deteriorating at an astonishing speed. It's very difficult to maintain a stable job now in the city. Losing a permanent job is not the worst situation since some of us just being sacked from the temp job. This made some of the teenage have to lookup some food on street.

Story 1 (story of a 33 yrs old guy at Shinjuko)
Mr. A used to have a stable job and he could claimed he had no doubt to stuff himself 3 meals a day. But he got slashed by the company and his saving are all consumed. He now even can't afford the rent so he have to stay on the street. Now, he can only stuff himself one meal a day by line up at the food bank for a bowl of hot food. But the organization only give out 155 meals a day so he can't be late, coz they will be all gone in 10 minutes.



Story 2 (at tokyo)
Another guy who got laidoff since Sept. It wasn't that bad at the very beginning coz he can afford going to the internet cafe to go online to lookup some jobs, to register his profile in some job agent. But his saving is evaporizing each day which makes him can't afford the rent; so eventually he is now sleeping at the internet cafe but not enough money to buy food.
So he sold his cellphone but then the agent or the company couldn't contact him. He now started to look up food from the bin.




found a residual hot meal from the bin


went to sleep after feeded

pictures extracted from japan TV and newspaper

I really hope the situation will be getting better and improved.

What is this "crisis" you speak of?

I get dibs on that new sig!

Global financial crisis? Is it that bad? I thought the yen was strong?

since the yen is "strong" companies cannot sell their Japanese products overseas and make the same profits they had. This lowers the profits of the companies and people are getting laid off.

It amazes me how when Japanese people get laid off, it seems more likely they will end up on the street than Americans or Europeans. Many Japanese people have the same job their whole life, if they lose it, they are not accustomed to finding work easily. Furthermore, this "lifetime employment" culture makes it hard to find a job when you are older (companies want young workers who will stay on with the company). Also during this "crisis", probably the only jobs available are working at 7-11 or such...but hell I know the 7-11's in tokyo are hiring...its not much but it beats homelessness.

Wow. Guess I have had my head in the sand a bit. Didn't know it was this level of bad in Japan too. Just been focusing on keeping myself afloat and still affording my toy collecting habit. Seems kind of petty compared to facing homelessness.
Crazy times we are living in.

Article at Time:

http://www.time.com/time/business/artic ... 97,00.html

Commentary at Neojaponisme regarding an interesting cultural aspect:

http://neojaponisme.com/2008/12/16/2008 ... pessimism/

Everyone I talk to there says that it's bad, but they're more concerned for me because the news there paints an even more dire picture of what's going on in America. I think we've all got it pretty bad at this point.

And the collectibles market, which was already in decline, is suffering pretty acutely now. I've heard that many of the freelancers who do sculpting and model making are being told that there won't be much work for them in the new year.

Oh roger, is PilotAce one of the victim ?

Never realised . . . I thought a strong Yen was a good thing for JPN! but they're as screwed as the rest of us!

With everyone in the same position I'm struggling to see how we (globally) are gonna dig our way outta this shitstorm!

Wonder if your 'new guy' is now wishing he'd lost . . .

I read somewhere that due to the high production costs and the low pound (I won't start bitching about that again... but i'm tempted) that companies like sony were actually losing money at wholesale and were going to have to raise the wholesale prices to compensate. Which would obviously translate to higher retail prices at a time when no one wants to see higher retail prices, or higher prices at all.

I'm sorry, I don't know who that is.

It was announced that Pilot Ace (http://www.pilot-ace.co.jp) was shutting down in another thread, and he's asking if that's because of current economic trends. He's asking you Rog, because you know all!

Totally unfamiliar with them, sorry.

G, I don't get this. You made nearly a million dollars from investing on shares when the economy is so low then why are you posting stuff like this on the board?

Taking advantage on other people's losses and suffering, then posting stuff like this is a bit too much for me to read. Why do you keep talking about the recession endlessly on so many threads when all it is giving you is profit?? Like your constant reference to how RxH is right now without any sensitivities towards the people that bought RxH from you on this board at peak prices.

I don't mind people buying shares and taking advantage of the recent economy. However I find your behaviour on this topic is very strange and somewhat sad. It's not like it doesn't happen whether the economy is high or low. If you are posting this stuff just to reassure your success then I feel sorry for you.

hmm..interesting

You pass the same people on the way up as you do on the way down.

First of all, we are grown-ups and dare to see or hear any fact of current situation. I am not a reporter but I found there is some interesting topic we need to share with others.
If it is fault to point out "FACT" just because someone don't or not dare to face. I suggest one may go and live in china coz they have a pretty strict control on news posting.
If someone who flip open and stick close to cnn, NYT, bloomberg, even HK local newspaper, there are much more severe news like listed company broke, people killing itself due to lost on investment, etc...

Sometimes we need to live in reality, and get prepared for the worst when it come, or sometimes we need some "CHANGE". It's not time to stray away from knowing the fact.

Some people made a warning on this crisis even 4 yrs ago, you may know his name if u watched the news. He sold everything but at the same time he keep writing articles warning people how bad it may be. But anyway, if someone don't want to see or hear fact, it's up to them.

truth & wisdom.

I'm confused as to whats going on....
but then again, when is that NOT normal? lol

no matter how bad the economy gets...whether stocks go up or down..I'm keeping my Tandy stock

I think quite a few members here still remember I sold all my toys because of the medical bill of my parents. All the money from selling toys is for making a fortune ?
I could only say, the illness of my parents make me sell all the toys to pay partial of the bill. The bill is just come at the right moment.

I really couldn't stand the childish perspective of not being able to accept any posting of the reality. Please go back to the toy thread, this section is called "Whatever"

And investing is a habbit, no matter the economy is good or bad, one still have to invest. One should invest in tangible thing (asset, shares, collectibles) and also in intangible things (study, donation)

I saw quite a few here are pretty good at discussing the economic phenomena, BUT some are pretty good at hijacking thread.

He's coming in at the perfect time. When the markets finally bottom out, the only way to go is up. He will look like a godsend even though most of the "fixes" will be in place before he even takes office.

There are really a huge number of homeless people in Japan. In some subway stations, you can see them literally lined up along the wall, sleeping there to keep out of the cold. Fortunately, they're allowed that level of comfort (in some countries, they'd be thrown out).

Another way of gauging how bad things are in Japan is to look where people are shopping. The Daiso chains (lots of 100 yen stuff) have always got plenty of customers. Same for UniQlow. They make really nice clothes, but with no design, branding, etc. Absolutely packed with people buying $8 sweaters and $20 cashmere (!!) scarves.

I was also told (without even asking) by several toy shop owners that people in Japan just flat out haven't got money to buy things. Some sales, sure, but if things stay this bad, I wouldn't be surprised to see a lot more store closures (and a lot more people in the "Buy Back" lines at Mandarake). Pilot Ace was the most recent victim. I really wonder if Golden Age and others will give up the ghost and decide to just go 100% online + toy shows.

When the Yen was 110-120 and the dollar was doing well, that was good for the Yen. Now? Probably the only people making out "well" in this economy are those investing their Yen (if they have that much) in U.S. real estate. Beyond that, make room on the boat because we're all in it.

Yeah there's just no good play here, is there?

I remember the heady days of 115-120 yen/1 USD days. I even bought a bit at 109 in anticipation of a falling dollar. That worked out, but that yen is long since spent. When I had to trade at 92.5/1 a couple weeks ago it was gutting. Now we're below 90, and everything in Japan looks a hell of a lot more expensive.

Given the wretched state of the world economy, for a lot of kaiju makers, their *only* play left is to start selling directly to consumers from Japan. I really don't want to see the well dry up from the folks making the sofubi we love, so I hope more follow Gargamel and Secret Base's lead. Either that or someone (S7?) needs to set up a "clearing house" in Tokyo for sofubi makers looking for overseas customers. And I think that needs to happen within a few months. Either that or we all cross our fingers for the yen to collapse. Since the US is nearly insolvent, who knows if that will happen unless Obama pulls off some kind of miracle turnaround.