I acknowledge and sympathize with the pain this will cause, but in regards to Japan itself: Good for them. Not because it is a rightward shift, but because it is a shift toward pragmatism in the face of the inherent tension between respect for all people and respect for one's own people and culture.

In my humble opinion, an ideal world is a liberal one with cherry-picked, tightly controlled, practical conservative elements that boldly take on the intimidating job of maintaining the balance between love and reason.

I mean, sure, so long as they're willing to deal with the consequences of an aging population and a shrinking workforce.

I mean, sure, so long as they're willing to deal with the consequences of an aging population and a shrinking workforce.

They're pretty clearly aware of the dire fear-mongering, and chose their path accordingly. They decided to sidestep the pyramid scheme of perpetual growth.

Here in Canada we've been pitched this same scary argument for decades, leading to outrageous levels of immigration, coupled with a growing entitlement among the class (which leads to a complete refusal to integrate in any meaningful way, often while incanting the laughable pablum about mosaic versus melting pot while dragging regressive, destructive habits and cultural norms to Canada, tragedy of the commons behaviour, etc).

Somehow this mass immigration has made us older, and less competitive, moving in exactly the opposite direction of the magical solution it promised while giving away the country. It has led to massive lines for every job, downward pressure on wages, and oversubscribed services at every level.

---

Every now and then there is a discussion about the difference between an "expat" and an "immigrant", but it really is important that people are honest about the difference, because it is very real, and it is informative to why the myth of immigration as a solution doesn't track with the reality that immigration is often massively destructive.

An expat is usually some Westerner that moved to some random country for adventure, a change, whatever. Occasionally they send a postcard home and share videos from the beach. Whatever.

An immigrant, on the other hand, is someone that moves to a country as a beachhead to drag their entire extended family there, often then expanding out from there. Which is precisely what many Western countries have seen where they bring in the "skilled worker", and then the skilled worker drags over their elderly parents, and also their "auntie" as a purported childcare giver, and then registers a business and sponsors their village through every loophole and circumvention, and then... This has destroyed the acceptance of immigration and completely obliterated the "oh you're getting older, something something labour shortage" nonsense.

We need to move on from the mass immigration is the solution horseshit, because all it has done is led every developed country to lurch perilously to the right, giving an easy open for charlatans to take advantage of a real problem to push a lot of ancillary things as well.

Somehow this mass immigration has made us older, and less competitive, moving in exactly the opposite direction of the magical solution it promised while giving away the country. It has led to massive lines for every job, downward pressure on wages, and oversubscribed services at every level.

Context for others: Already much wealthier on a real GDP per-capita basis, the US increased its lead over Canada from 2000 to 2025 <https://fred.stlouisfed.org/graph/?g=1YbGu>. The US began the period 28.2% higher, and finished 49.5% higher. Note the lack of growth in the Canadian line that began c. 2015.

Put another way, 100% of Canadian GDP growth since 2015 has been from population growth. Now that the latter has been significantly (not completely) cut back, the country is in a recession (which the bien-pensant media never fails to adding the word "technical" before saying so).

Here in Canada we've been pitched this same scary argument for decades, leading to outrageous levels of immigration, coupled with a growing entitlement among the class (which leads to a complete refusal to integrate in any meaningful way, often while incanting the laughable pablum about mosaic versus melting pot while dragging regressive, destructive habits and cultural norms to Canada, tragedy of the commons behaviour, etc).

If Trump announced that after annexation the US would deport every TFW/"student" that has arrived since 2015, public opinion would massively swing toward joining the US ASAP.

I'm not following your argument at all, if they had taken no immigrants, the GDP would just be even worse then, and Canada would be even further behind.

It seems no Canadian-born has managed to produce efficiencies or innovations, and only increased labor workforce through immigration has allowed higher production of goods/services (to increase GDP). So wouldn't that mean Canada would have been way worse off without those immigrants?

None of this happens in isolation. If you flood a country with a torrent of migrants, everything else just doesn't continue as is with that one thing happening on the side.

For instance in Canada there was, and remains, a housing shortage. Suddenly a ridiculous amount of our economy turned to speculation on and leveraging of housing. Housing is multi-factorial and there are certainly other issues at play, but it was incredible during the height of outrageous migration when apologists would pretend this adding millions of new people that need to be housed in a short period of time was somehow not a factor (suddenly the demand in S&D didn't matter, because it was a protected topic).

I know even in my neighbourhood migrant families that bought houses they could not possibly afford -- the space was endemic with astonishing levels of fraud, and you could just make up whatever imaginary income you want -- at grossly inflated prices, and the only way they could swing it is to then move a number of international "students" in their basement, the "students" then working full time at minimum wage and often below, etc. A race to the bottom. This sort of knock-on effect happened everywhere. Brampton is basically a giant tinderbox now because it was a city built on this sort of pyramid scheme/fraud nonsense.

Investments all flooded to the same spaces[1]. Who wants to build a business or make a product when you can just make an international "college" or start another exploitative low value human trafficking operation to give points to desperate migrants looking to game the system.

Every business in Canada was competing with race to the bottom "who can hire the most migrants, many who'll actually pay for the right to work" alternatives. Increasing efficiency, automation, etc -- none of it mattered at all, because it can't possibly compete with the place flooding with migrants who'll tolerate anything and accept close to nothing in return. While similar countries were increasing efficiencies, automating, and so on, we were moving to a human trafficking economy. This is true in Canada's agricultural industry where it's like the 1940s because farmers just got accustomed to massive numbers of migrants coming and doing manual labour.

Now add that as the best of the best graduated from Canadian colleges and university, they could take a grossly underpaid job with a Canadian employer, where almost all of their coworkers will be "accept anything" migrants, and fight to pay a million dollars for some shoebox condo....or they could move elsewhere. A shocking number just decided to move elsewhere, primarily the US.

This was hugely destructive to Canada. It was a massive mistake, and we have a lost decade to show for it.

[1] So did government spending. Why do major projects, seek new export markets, etc, when you can announce GDP growth regardless, even if the GDP per capita was flat to declining. A decade when we did nothing but celebrate how wonderfully diverse and tolerant we are.

A shocking number just decided to move elsewhere, primarily the US.

85% of University of Waterloo software engineering graduates move to the US. <https://x.com/danluu/status/1351785083598893062>

This is a longstanding trend, of course. One million people born in Canada <https://ourworldindata.org/where-do-migrants-live-and-where-...> live in the US, or about 2.4% of the 41.5 million total Canadians, while 260,000 people born in the United States <https://ourworldindata.org/where-do-migrants-live-and-where-...> live in Canada. The US's population of 338 million is eight times that of Canada's, so a Canadian is about 30 times more likely to move to the US, than an American is to move to Canada.

1.3 million Canadian-born live outside Canada, or about 3% of the Canadian population. 3.2 million American-born live outside the US, 1% of the US population.

the skilled worker drags over their elderly parents, and also their "auntie" as a purported childcare giver, and then registers a business and sponsors their village through every loophole and circumvention

It's a balancing at the regional/global level. People desire to move from worse situation to better, which leads to an averaging tendency of the source and destination. You don't like it because average means there's a little less per person where you are, since it's a destination. People at the source like the emigration because there's a little more per person (which hopefully isn't mostly absorbed by some "protective" group, like mafia, bad govt, etc). Let the balance happen; it leads to a better world overall.

Yes, physically that's a good description of the natural flow of things. No, it makes no sense for successful nations to suffer for the benefit of unsuccessful nations, generally speaking. What they should provide is aid, with varying specifics on what that means (e.g. it could be as simple as favorable trade).

To move everybody into the successful nations, rather than engage in the slow work of making all nations somewhat successful, is cruel and insane.

How are those nations suffering, when the reason that they're destinations is because they have a surplus of resources (I won't touch on the history that usually led to that surplus in the first place)? As long as a significant number of the immigrants aren't committing crimes and play by the rules the citizens go by to the best of their abilities, why is there an issue? Isn't the - ideal of the - "free market" supposed to be a thing all should aspire to?

I won't touch on the history that usually led to that surplus in the first place

You literally just did, only in that comedically vapid hand-wavy, bullshit way that's so common.

Germany got obliterated during two world wars and is a power house, again. Japan got nuked twice and is a powerhouse. China is now an absolute powerhouse. South Korea a powerhouse.

It turns out that when you stop doing the "woe am I! white man stole all the good stuff...somehow" horseshit, you can actually improve your lot.

Like if your country is a hyper-corrupt open-air garbage dump, maybe stop pointing at other countries as the cause and fix your own shit. And when enough people from that sort of culture -- and it is a culture, and culture can be judged, and some are simply garbage -- move to infinitely better countries, invariably they start dragging their busted, tragedy of the commons behaviours. They should be on the first mode of transport back.

why is there an issue?

Because the myth of the advantage of immigration -- the thing that gets a population to tolerate it as a wonderful solution for everyone -- in no universe matches the reality. It's a lie, and it's why so many countries have taken a super-hard turn to the right. What should be a worthwhile program to bring skills and perspective instead turns into a flood where you end up with ghettos of the source country, with all the same problems. No thanks.

Canada almost took a turn to the right, but the leading party actually made significant changes. Not nearly enough (the entire TFW program is just an enormous fraud, top to bottom, zero elderly relatives should ever come here, every non-citizen that commits even a minor crime should be ejected at first cause, the refugee program needs to have a 95%+ rejection rate, and so on). Canadians were done with the lie, so changes were made.

Turns out we still have millions of people who need to leave the country.

Isn't the - ideal of the - "free market" supposed to be a thing all should aspire to?

A free market is that there are a few countries that are extremely desirable, and a lot of, sorry to say, shitholes with garbage cultures. You should be extraordinary to have the privilege of moving to one of the better countries, and your behaviour when you get there had better be exemplary. Somehow we got in the situation where millions of dregs are flooding every Western country and recreating the shithole they left. In that case, shut it down, which again is happening everywhere.

That is the free market. People were sold a lie, and they're turning against it.

So much vitriol.

Germany got obliterated [...]

You're conveniently omitting the fact that they relied on massive external aid, security alliances, education expansion and more. China in particular rose up thanks to state-led industrial policies and having a heck of a lot of people to do stuff for cheap. And none of those countries were poached of their resources and their populations oppressed for decades/centuries.

Also funny you say people should improve their lot, when that's exactly what they're trying to do... somewhere where there's actually decent opportunity to improve said lot since that's generally absent in a "hyper-corrupt open-air garbage dump" (shaped by a history of colonial poaching, proxy conflicts, etc; these are relevant facts that people like you try to sweep under the rug). The majority not looking for handouts; they looking to make a life for themselves and their family.

You should be extraordinary [...]

Sorry to tell you that a genuinely free labour market means more mobility, not less. What you're describing is a highly regulated labour market with strong border controls. Get your definitions straight.

And yes, if some individual/group commits crimes, then sure they should be sent back or jailed like any citizen. But if they're making a honest living and paying their social dues then leave them the hell alone, regardless of how they arrived in the first place.

It's OK if they choose to seek other avenues for dealing with that problem. The easiest solution is often not the best, and sometimes there is no net-positive path forward.

It's baffling to me how we come up with economic justifications for forced mass immigration. Mass immigration of mainly non-western low skill / low education people is causing a catastrophic economic burden on western Europe. Unemployment rates of those are much higher than natives, even when you look at 2nd or 3rd generation. Not to mention that most European capitals have become poverty ghettos where the original inhabitants don't recognize their own country any longer. Non-EU foreign origins are overrepresented in crime and prison stats. There are not enough low skilled jobs. There is not enough housing. There is not enough infrastructure. Mass immigration is the most disruptive disaster that was ever forced upon western Europe (forced, because there has been a large democratic majority AGAINST this type of immigration since decades).

Very sad state of affairs. Good on Japan that they see the danger and try to do something about it before it's too late.

This is all... just nonsense? Like what is your source for any of this, some rightwing boomer facebook group?

Nothing has been forced upon Western Europe - we have aging populations and shrinking demographics, so a need for people to plug the holes in the workforce.

There is no illuminati-type conspiracy here. Japan has lost 5 mil people or so since 2010, and the median age is like 50. At some point there will be nobody to work and pay tax, no doctors or nurses to take care of the elderly What's the plan exactly to deal with this, what's the magic solution that doesn't somehow involve immigration?

This is going to cause more pain to the Japanese people.

This is a shift away from pragmatism; pragmatism would be acknowledging Japan's economic need for immigration.

Whether Europe or North America have a problem with too much immigration and not enough integration is debatable, maybe - and I suspect that's where your perspective comes from - but Japan decidedly does not (maybe too much tourism, and I feel at least some of the antagonism towards foreigners comes from that, but no matter). Immigrants still make up a very small percentage of the population, mostly in Tokyo; given the existing challenges with immigration, they tend to be extremely diligent, respectful, appreciative of Japanese culture, and hard-working.

This is just a populist conservative government pandering to the some of the worst aspects in society to distract from their failures.

What's pragmatic depends on your values.

I think most people would say that's sort of the opposite of the meaning of the word "pragmatic", actually.

applicants for permanent residency will need to show that their annual household income exceeds the Japanese average

Can someone explain why they think this is a detrimental practice for native Japanese?

Can someone explain why they think this is a detrimental practice for native Japanese?

You're quoting a practice applied to foreigners, but you say "for native Japanese". Maybe there was a typo, or I could be misreading?

From the article “Japan needs foreign workers because of labour shortages. But if the conditions for long-term settlement become substantially more difficult, this could potentially reduce Japan’s attractiveness to foreign workers who are considering Japan as a place to build their long-term lives,”

Specifically, Japan needs workers in human services to physically care for the very large elderly population. They need them so badly that they are in the process of implementing easier work visas for them. But do you think those jobs pay more than the national average?

No, but that's the point. They don't want long-term residents, they want short-term labor. This has been the goal for a long time, and if you move to Japan expecting anything else you'll be disappointed.

"Labour shortage" is just the business's perspective on "plenty of jobs!"

If there truly is a shortage of outstanding jobs, then they can compete and raise salaries and the least significant roles ultimately won't get filled, which is optimal.

Think of the US - the reduction of low wage immigrants has been a large factor in our economy lately. Food prices have gone up, and in the long term there's fewer young families getting added to the social security system.

While it's cute to think that suddenly these jobs are going to Americans, but these are mostly undesirable jobs that pay less than typical jobs. To the extent that they even get filled by native workers, it drives real wages down and not up.

Meanwhile, only allowing immigrants from the top of the income bracket crowds out the top side of the job market.

It's a lowering tide that lowers all boats.

This is very one-sided. There are plenty of low income and working class people who have suddenly found more work than they have had in years due to reductions in immigration.

What's the empirical evidence that proves this? If the economy gets worse as a result of lack of immigration, its going to reduce opportunities for low income and working class people.

It restricts immigration to cities where the high wages are, ie. Tokyo which is itself already too crowded, and forces foreigners living in less populated parts of the country to leave, further depopulating it.

It also heavily disadvantages singles.

If there were a significant amount of such people coming in it would push up the cost of living for the average-(or below-average)-income Japanese citizen.

Look at any of the Western cities that became attractive for retirement or "investment properties" for wealthy international folks... it makes everything more expensive for everyone already there.

If the concern was just about preventing things from changing for existing citizens, restrictions across the income band would seem to make much more sense.

Requiring proficiency in the language is reasonable, but requiring everyone to be richer than the average member of the population and have enough money banked to live off of for 30 years seems insane. That goes well beyond simply making sure that people are able to care for themselves.

I think the argument is that the requirements should be stricter than "able to care for themselves".

The US has something like this, but the income threshold is lower.[1] US immigrants in most categories have to show that they will not become a "public charge", that is, need US welfare benefits.

[1] https://www.uscis.gov/newsroom/alerts/uscis-issues-guidance-...

That's reasonable too. People who move to a new country should be able to support themselves there and have a good chance to thrive in their new home. If the average income of the population isn't enough for that to be possible, your country has bigger problems than immigrants

Mostly you need immigrants for the jobs that your osn population doesn’t want. Nobody is going to pay above average for those jobs.

If there aren’t any immigrants to work them, either the pay will increase or the product/service will disappear. Essential services and products won’t disappear, so this seems okay?

If we look at it from the other direction, we are artificially increasing quality of life by taking advantage of foreigners who have no better option than to work for little pay. Getting rid of this seems positive?

Essential services disappear all the time. Look at the increasing rarity of teachers and the effect that has on student/teacher ratios or quality. Same with medical staff, farm labor, and dozens of other industries.

I'm not saying that exploiting immigrants for labor is necessarily good, but the free hand of the labor market doesn't usually achieve policy goals.

Every single person who came through Ellis Island <https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-brooklyn-daily-eagle-...>

* was a legal immigrant

* had passed a medical inspection

* had proof of having enough resources to pay for their upkeep in the US, or a US financial sponsor guaranteeing same

* was turned away if failing any of the above tests, with no possibility of appeal

Shipping liner companies were charged to return ineligible passengers to their origin (the same is true with airlines today), so they had every incentive to verify ahead of time that they could enter the destination country. The "only 2% of immigrants were rejected at Ellis Island" statistic often bandied-about by the pro-open borders side elides the restrictions that caused the rate to be so low in the first place.

I, for one, am very much in favor of reinstating such barriers to entering the US.

Why? The US doesn’t have a problem of too many people „draining“ the country resources.

Something like two thirds of the US federal budget is spent on some form of welfare. Assuming you want to keep that ratio you could spend more per person with fewer people withdrawing from that system.

On average, foreign born US residents use less public assistance then native born.

I'd love to see some source for this, because from what I've seen, 59% of undocumented immigrants receive some form of welfare (the state of California spends roughly $10 billion a year alone on this) and documented migrants are at roughly the same rate, double the native born population's rate of 28%.

Not hard to find, here is a right wing, anti-immigrant anti-service source:

https://www.cato.org/blog/immigrants-still-use-much-less-wel...

I'd love to see some source for this [proceeds to throw out a bunch of source-free numbers]

I looked up the source for these numbers.

It's the Center for Immigration Studies, and they are notorious for being a right-wing think tank used to dress up up anti-immigration policy using misleading statistics.

How notorious are they? Well, they are listed as a hate group with the Southern Poverty Law Center[1].

The numbers you're citing aren't 'welfare,' the biggest thing is using the education system. The thing that, long term, makes they into productive taxpayers. CIS doesn't figure the long-term benefits into their numbers because that would destroy their thesis.

[1] https://www.splcenter.org/resources/extremist-files/center-i...

This is a statistic that is technically true but has some hidden nuance.

Depending on what gets counted, "public assistance" stats like this usually include medicare and social security. (Social security gets debated because of how it's paid-in, but I'm not here to argue that. The fact is, it gets included in these stats). Those two make up the dominant consumption of public assistance to the point that things we hear about in the media like food stamps are kind of a rounding error.

Medicare and social security are collected primarily by older people. Foreign born populations have much lower numbers of people in that age bracket than the general popualtion.

Combine those two facts and it's not surprising that when you look at charts of foreign born vs native born, the foreign born population uses less public assistance.

It's a statistic that is more about age distribution than anything. Like when you one of those bad maps trying to prove a point but really just showing population density of big cities.

Completely wrong, except possibly if you're defining Social Security as welfare, in which case honesty would compel you to note that no one draws Social Security except based on having previously made contributions via dedicated taxation for social security.

Just a reminder... Social Security requires 40 quarters (ie, 10 years) of income to even qualify for a pension. And the pension is based on what you earn, which is what you pay into the system.

Only 10 years? Damn, here in many EU countries you need to contribute much longer than that to qualify for receiving a pension. And supposedly we're the "socialist" ones.

The US doesn’t lack the capital for welfare. The country decides to instead waste its resources fighting wars, fighting its allies, fighting its trade partners. The money is here, there is no will to allocate it to welfare. You could reduce the number of people on welfare by a massive amount and none of the savings from that would get distributed to the remaining recipient

Those wars are essential to protecting our economic interests. An isolationist US is impossible. We're pretty much a modern imperial power.

The US economy did great prior to 1900 or so. During this period, we did not have significant military action outside of the Americas, and we avoided peacetime alliances. From 1820-1900 the US economy exploded from about 40% the size of the UK economy to about 200% the size of the UK economy.

https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/gdp-maddison-project-data...

Switzerland has a per capita GDP exceeding the US while pursuing isolationist foreign policy. They are the world's most popular country in opinion polls.

No, they're essential to protecting Benjamin Netanyahu's ass. No more and no less.

Less vindictively, the only economic interest the US has in the Middle East is oil. Relying on oil for your energy needs is, in 2026, a choice and not a requirement. Wind, solar, and the batteries you need to store them are continuously getting cheaper. And for the people who are net consumers of energy - primarily the US, Europe, and China - renewables are better for everything, but especially they're better for energy independence!

The only things that require oil are airplanes, plastics, and industrial chemical processes (like we make asphalt out of oil and certain inks out of naphtha). Eliminating most of the energy demand for oil would mean a significantly reduced dependence on foreign oil, and more specifically, the political dependence on low gas prices. America rebuilt all its cities in the image of the car and, as a result, made gasoline/petrol a necessary ingredient of urban mobility. This was, again, a choice - we absolutely could have retained and grown our dense urban cores and we can still rebuild what was destroyed.

But this requires an entire governing body at every level that is not a corpse paraded by the ghosts of Tammany Hall, Standard Oil, and Hitler. The primary crisis in America that is driving these wars is a fundamental lack of political will for alternatives.

was a legal immigrant

Technically true, extremely misleading. The law placed vastly fewer restrictions on who was a legal immigrant for much of that period. Of course, it is true starting in 1921, and 1924, legislation was put in place to limit immigration by "undesirables" such as Asians, Italians and Slavs.

Curious...which one of those regimes do you want to bring back?

I'm not sure people should be forced to live with those they feel xenophobia towards, even if one grants that the feelings of xenophobia have no basis in reality.

They are free to move somewhere else. I don't see why you need to coddle that sort.

OK, so considering Sweden, if Sweden is flooded with immigrants, where should the Swedes who just want to live with other Swedes go? Australia??

Also you do realize that your preferred migration policy will lead to microaggressions (and possibly macroaggressions) against immigrants? If people don't have democratic means to keep out disliked foreigners, they may be tempted to try alternatives. The ballot box is ultimately an alternative to violence.

Race-hate is a syndrome, not an entitlement.

They can go anywhere they want to. If they can't handle it, they can leave.

And no, we don't negotiate with terrorists. If people try violence, they go to prison. We don't want antisocial people in our society.

Also don’t forget:

1) Only 12 million immigrants came through Ellis Island in 60 years.

2) 30-40% returned home

3) The U.S. strictly restricted immigration for more than 40 years to assimilate the immigrants.

4) Even after all that, the U.S. paid a heavy price. It took until the 1980s to clean up the Italian mafia in New York. And immigrant political machines were the origin of the corrupt political structures in cities like New York and Chicago today.

Only 12 million immigrants came through Ellis Island in 60 years.

About ten and a half million of those in 15 years, from 1900 to 1914. Against a 1900 US population of about 76 million.

The U.S. strictly restricted immigration for more than 40 years to assimilate the immigrants.

Or, you know, because the political wind changed.

Even after all that, the U.S. paid a heavy price. It took until the 1980s to clean up the Italian mafia in New York.

Right. Because nobody else would've filled that niche.

And immigrant political machines were the origin of the corrupt political structures in cities like New York

The Tammany Hall machine was founded in 1789, was basically running New York by the 1850s, and was in the thick of New York corruption well past the relevance of Ellis Island.

and Chicago today.

Chicago Democrats were immigrants around the relevant time. Chicago Republicans were from older stock. Both were corrupt.

Or, you know, because the political wind changed.

Assimilation was the effect of immigration restriction, whether or not that was the motivation. It broke up the chains of migration that facilitated maintenance of separate cultural enclaves.

Right. Because nobody else would've filled that niche.

Canada and Australia never had a similar problem.

The Tammany Hall machine was founded in 1789, was basically running New York by the 1850s, and was in the thick of New York corruption well past the relevance of Ellis Island.

Tammany Hall was not a political machine in 1789. According to Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tammany_Hall ("Following the 1854 mayoral election and the resulting mayoralty of Fernando Wood, Tammany Hall controlled Democratic Party nominations and political patronage in Manhattan for over a century through its organized network of loyal, well-rewarded, and largely Irish Catholic district and precinct leaders.").

To be clear, the point isn't that they were Irish. As far as I can tell, Ireland isn't more corrupt than other western european countries. It was the political dynamics that arose from the presence of a large culturally distinct immigrant population.

and Chicago today.

Irish domination of Chicago's political machine long outlasted the Ellis Island era, well into the 1970s: https://www.thelastward.org/p/what-happened-to-chicagos-iris....

Canada and Australia never had a similar problem.

Greetings from Canada. I live in Montreal. We have more of a Mafia problem nowadays than New York (no RICO here), and we were comparable in the 1930s. Bootleggers, remember? Where do you think they were running the booze from? Same "market", same mob. Yeah, they managed to dominate everybody else. That's what I mean about "niches". In fact they did it worldwide, and according to Wikipedia they're prominent in Australia, too. These are transnational groups. The Mafia is also big in Sicily. Are you going to say that's because of (checks notes) Sicilian immigration? Specifically because of a huge wave around 1900?

We also have Hell's Angels here. Ethnically "white". No immigrant identification whatsoever, totally acculturated... although I assume some of them moved here from the US. Pretty racist and anti-immigrant, actually. Cool fact: I used to live two houses away from Sonny Barger in beautiful Oakland, California. OK, it wasn't actually that cool. Those guys were really noisy. But I assure you they did not come through Ellis Island.

Apparently Winnipeg has First Nations gangs (Indians to you). Kinda the opposite of immigrants.

... plus a grab bag of others, some of them organized by immigrants. Yes, organized crime tends to segregate itself ethnically, so if one group gets the upper hand, you're likely to see its ethnicity as the face of the problem. But all ethnicities get to play, and they will expand into any available vacuum. If you hadn't had the Italian Mafia (worldwide), you'd have had something else (at least regionally).

And it's not always ethnic. Apparently there's a gang in BC that actually calls itself the United Nations.

Tammany Hall was not a political machine in 1789.

It sure was by 1854, eh, according to your own quote? That was 38 years before Ellis Island opened. Before the specific wave of immigration that you're claiming caused the problem. Goalposts. You are moving them.

Irish domination of Chicago's political machine long outlasted the Ellis Island era

... and preceded it. Your own link says "Of the 28 most influential Chicago aldermen of the 1890s, 24 were Irish.". I don't think they teleported from Ellis Island and took over in under 8 years.

The US requirements are so much lower that calling them similar does a disservice.

The proposed requirements in Japan require earnings to exceed Japan's average and also for them to have an equivalent of 30 years of pension payouts saved up.

The US requirements are not as specific, but for comparison one of the numbers is that that families need to have an income requirement 25% higher than federal poverty guidelines, which very low compared to average US incomes.

they don't require 30 years saved up, only showing (somehow) that you will be able to generate such a pension equivalent over time. I suspect that will be very squishy in practice.

I was going by the article, which says this:

Applicants will also be required to have a pension pot equivalent to 30 years of payouts.

If there's a better article to read, I'd appreciate a link.

“ive me your tired, your poor, > Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, > The wretched refuse of your teeming shore. > Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me, > I lift my lamp beside the golden door!

The U.S. was founded as a nation of immigrants, and has a cultural history of being exceptionally immigrant-friendly (compared to other nations), especially with regard to immigrants without much means.

I don't believe other nations have any obligation to follow this example. On the contrary, they should be able to set whatever immigration policies make sense for them. But this model of letting in poor immigrants, letting them do the work that nobody else wants to do, and letting their kids become net contributors, does seem to have benefited the U.S. greatly over the past few centuries.

I dunno... 1790 Naturalization Act says only white people could become citizens. Sounds like they were friendly towards immigration from very specific countries.

Roosevelt's 1915 Americanism address also reveals this:

https://www.gutenberg.org/files/68152/68152-h/68152-h.htm

He says americanism "is a matter of the spirit and of the soul". In the very next paragraph, the so called "hyphenated americans" are condemned. This is perfectly reasonable.

However, note the examples used:

  German-Americans
  Irish-Americans
  English-Americans
  French-Americans
  Scandinavian-Americans
  Italian-Americans

The implication is only the souls of white europeans were eligible for americanization.

There is even legal precedent for this:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._Bhagat_Singh_...

In 1923, the supreme court decided an indian was not eligible for citizenship because he was not white.

So arguably the US was a white ethnoatate from the very beginning. This stuff only really went away after the 1965 Hart-Celler Act, just over half a century ago.

That goes well beyond simply making sure that people are able to care for themselves.

I am not sure in understand the issue, if Japanese want this, what’s the problem?

Just because some people want something that doesn't suddenly make it reasonable or wise. In this case it's a problem for many already successful people living in Japan currently who will be forced to leave. It's also a problem for Japanese companies who have hired those people or who want to attract foreign talent to positions that pay well, but don't typically leave someone fabulously wealthy compared to most of the people living around them. It's also a problem because the policy is coming in at a time of increased xenophobia and overt racism and while this policy is likely to reduce the total number of foreigners living in Japan, it's unlikely to address the problems people have with the foreigners who will remain, and it could actually make those problems worse.

It's their country. They can do what they want as long as they don't start another war.

I don't think anyone plans on trying to step in and intervene, but I hope people also don't shy from talking about how foolish this move is, the problems it won't solve, the problems it's likely to cause, and the people whose lives are being negatively impacted by it.

Why don't you trust the Japanese to know wha they're doing when it comes to their own society? After all, they're the ones who built an amazing country everyone wants to visit!

Because the yen is weak is a big reason why visiting is appealing. Its also a big reason why their population is dwindling.

The govt is just trying to point fingers at foreigners to hide their weakness. I think recently they made a big deal about foreign owned real estate then quickly forgot about that talking point when their own study showed it equated to something like .05% of their total housing.

That’s not the point I’m making. Japan is clearly a wonderful society, seeing as how many people want to visit and immigrate. Why not trust the people who built that society that they know what they’re doing?

Something must be done, this is something, we must do it!

Just because something can be done doesn't make it good for the society. Japan has a shrinking population and is currently dependent on immigrants for low wage work. Plenty of actions can make the current problem worse and have unintended consequences. Whether they happen or not is a political question, not a moral one.

Who determined "what they want?" Did you want your government to attack Iran? Are you responsible for it? Why not?

That's their problem to solve however they want, if they want. The population shrinking by some large percentage doesn't seem to be inherently bad to me, and probably is good.

It's so laughable to me when people say "BUT THE SHAREHOLDER VALUE!" when we talk about things like the important life trends of millions of people.

For Japan, shrinking population will mean an aging population with no one to care for them.

I am not sure in understand the issue, if Japanese want this, what’s the problem?

The problem is I’ve built my life here and they keep treating foreigners as a lesser life form. People here can unironically be standing next to me bitching about foreigners. Then turn to me and say something like “not you, you are fine.”

Clearly Japanese feel like they don't want immigrants or want very few of them, which is fine.

With these laws, they are pushing 99% of people out while saving face from being called racists.

I think every country should have a right over their borders. Japan wasn't built on multiculturalism like United States or Canada, so I'm not surprised.

That being said, I would probably think twice about traveling to Japan as a tourist.

They don't want to risk someone coming for a job, getting fired and becoming a drain on the social safety net. Able to care for themselves not just now, but for a while. It's a reasonable position.

That’s the case for every western country, and none ask for enough money to cover 30y of life. That’s way, way above the goal you mention

That goes well beyond simply making sure that people are able to care for themselves.

That’s not the standard. The standard is making sure someone is really a huge contribution to the society such that it offsets the burden of immigration.

The 30 years thing is insane for sure. Making more money than the average might be insane, it depends on how much more (which I didn't spot in the article, maybe I missed it).

requiring everyone to be richer than the average member of the population

In the UK, only 47% are net tax contributors. I can't find what the same statistic is for Japan. I don't believe it's wrong for there to be an expectation that they be a net contributor.

In the UK, only 47% are net tax contributors.

47% of what? Of the immigrants coming in the UK are net tax contributors or 47% of the total population including locals?

47% of individuals live in households that are net contributors.

https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/personal...

Across the UK, 53.3% of people lived in households that were net recipients in FYE 2024. This means that they lived in households that received more in benefits (cash and benefits in kind) than they paid in taxes (direct and indirect).

The situation is skewed by the fact that 3.1 million people receive in-work credit because pay is so poor.

It's a straightforward subsidy for employer profits.

Most countries need both VAT and income tax to fund their budget. Importing well off immigrants means they subsidize the VAT part only and likely do not generate income from Japan salaries. This is basically same problem as with digital nomads: they use the infrastructure which they do not fund proportionally compared to regular citizens.

Am I missing something here?

Dollar multipliers and sources.

A digital nomad is still economically positive when a) their money circulates locally, eg at cafes and restaurants and b) comes from outside the region. That’s because they’re bringing wealth generated elsewhere (ie, at their employer) into the region.

While you’re correct the state misses out on income taxes, they get taxes on further spending, eg, when those digital nomad supplied dollars are used to pay wages at the cafe.

Not specifically about digital nomads, but Amazon used to estimate their salary dollars induce $2.5 of additional local economic activity — as Amazon employees bought from local stores, the store employees did in turn, etc.

when those digital nomad supplied dollars are used to pay wages at the cafe

Nations whose economies depend on foreign tourist coming to spend their money there, are some of the worst developed out there, have a disproportionately high low wage sector, and some of the highest wealth inequalities out there with the lowest opportunities for upwards mobility. Basically a dutch disease. Nobody wants their economy to be like that if they can avoid it.

Countries aren't gonna be improved by you moving to buy 2$ lattes there while you gentrify the locals in the process and making life more expensive for them, trapping them in perpetual indentured servitude catering to the digital nomad/tourist industry with little to no possibility of moving up the value chain. The only ones who will be happy you do this will be landlords and business owners in the hospitality industry but no developed economy is built with those two as its pillars.

Developed nations want an export economy of products and services aided by imported skilled workers to stay as long term residents and contribute in income taxes, not in latte purchases, and maybe even become citizens so they can become eligible for the draft in case shit were to hit the fan. Digital nomads are like locusts by comparisons, they come to treat your country like and amusement park in a race to the bottom while the going is good, but leave at the slightest inconvenience if now the 2$ latte now has to be 3$ due to increased labor protections, when the impoverished country next door sells it for 2.50$.

Digital nomads are like locusts by comparisons, they come to treat your country like and amusement park in a race to the bottom while the going is good, but leave at the slightest inconvenience if now the 2$ latte now has to be 3$ due to increased labor protections, when the impoverished country next door sells it for 2.50$.

This assumes they come just to geoarbitrage. Many want to experience a country for its nature, food, culture, people etc.

I work remotely/seasonally while traveling the world to learn local languages, learn about traditional culture, see nature out away from cities (I'm a bikepacker), etc. It is rare that I meet other digital nomads interested in those things; the vast majority really do come just to geoarbitrage. When I meet other foreigners deeply invested in the specifics of the country, they are more likely to be students, pensioners, or the independently wealthy, not DNs.

That stat is bogus though when used in this context. The least payed workers contribute the most to every day life of society in my opinion and pay the least tax.

Isn’t this just a reflection of wealth inequality though? A “net negative” tax payer is just working a job that makes one of the net positive payers richer thus still bringing in more income for the country.

requiring everyone to be richer than the average member of the population and have enough money banked to live off of for 30 years seems insane

It would be insane for a country that is already dealing with an overburdened social welfare system to grant permanent residency to someone who is, say, 60 years old and doesn't have any savings or pension income to support them in retirement.

That's fair, but the stereotypical immigrant isn't near retirement. Positive migration tends to be related to youth, and it's hard to imagine that this will work for most.

Which, fair, it's their right to close the door fully, but lack of immigration and a greatly aged population sounds like a recipe for collapse.

Applicants will also be required to have a pension pot equivalent to 30 years of payouts.

Does this take into account the amount of pension a person would still accumulate under Japanese employment, or will this immediately disqualify anyone under 45?

That’s like 12 x 30 x ¥35000 = 12600000 yen. ＄84000. I don’t know about others, but I consider myself pretty well off and I do not have that kind of money.

That's too low. The National Basic Pension is around 60,000 yen per month and with traditional employer part on top (not everyone has it), it's 140,000 yen/month. I would think a foreigner immigrant would need to bring the equivalent of around $160k in a retirement savings account or similar.

This is certainly going to conflict with their moves to make it easier to attract aged care workers to the country. Perhaps all the elderly people are expected to patriotically look after themselves?

https://unseen-japan.com/foreign-elderly-care-workers-japan/

They're banking on robots with advanced AI brains to take care of them.

These are not in conflict. The recent changes make almost impossible for a low-wage worker in the elderly care sector to get permanent residence and hence become a "burden" to society longterm, but on the other hand, specified skilled worker visa (SSW) program expands even more. The gist of it is that the worker can come and work for a specific industry (in reality it almost always means specific company) for a 5 years max and then fuck off back to their country.

I shit you not, this is the plan.

Wow and care workers expected to be submitted to this vampiric scheme are expected to provide hood care? How naive can the japanese be?

They are not naive, they are malicious (to be clear: I'm not generalizing towards all Japanese, just to the ruling majority). Following is only my speculation but I guess the plan is to use short-term workers until promised breakthrough in AI and robotics closes this need altogether.

Watch them learn the hard lesson that automotive companies had to learn with self-driving. The progress looks amazing at the start but those last few unnegotiable percent hide most of the work. Hands are incredibly dexterous, we don't have comparable tech let alone affordable enough to outcompete cheap immigrant labour. Maybe they can automate elderly care fast enough, but it's one heck of a gamble.

public sentiment towards immigrants sours

I'm not up to date with Japanese news, does anyone know the reason for that?

The immigrants create a lot or trouble.

You know what creates 100 more trouble than immigrants ? Japan’s birth rate.

You know who have babies? Immigrants.

You know who pays social security for peuple when they get older ? Those grown up babies.

Do the math. Japan has much to teach the world but the most important lesson they are now teaching, is that people are stupid, easily manipulated, excessively xenophobic and absolutely happy to shoot themselves in the foot repeatedly if it means not admitting they’re wrong. In Japan, in the US, in Europe and elsewhere.

Dumb dumb humans…

And yet, according to available statistics, there's no a single western country where Muslim and African immigrants are not an additional financial burden. Even if we forget about safety, crime, ...

according to available statistics

I appreciate you basing your argument in statistics, but if you have them to hand, could you link to them?

:)

If you have problems finding it just ask the AI. But you should avoid companies controlled by the pro immigrant elite.

Thank you, that comment told me everything I wanted to know.

* * *

even if that means I will never be able to be accepted there

You need Japanese blood (visibly), culture (language, manner, custom), and nationality to be "fully" accepted. This isn't new and has more to do with Japanese people themselves than with any legal restriction.

Can you name which backgrounds you/Japanese people are talking about?

What confuses me is that Japan is not a very immigrant-heavy country. There's no chance of someone who doesn't represent the interests of native Japanese people being elected any time soon, or ever. So why can't they pass laws codifying the behaviors they want to encourage and ones they will treat as non-assimilation? Why aren't they doing something to address misbehavior directly, making newcomers to the country prove their long-term commitment to their new social and cultural environment, or punishing infractions more harshly so bad actors can't stay in the country? Why are the only two options available to them 'do nothing' or 'blanket punish all foreigners because all foreigners are trouble'?

It is part of Japan being Japan. Japanese being Japanese.

Japan is a shame based culture. A lot of social norms are encoded as part of being Japanese and not strictly enforced. Japan has less lawyers per capita compared to US for example.

Take a look at a lot of the influencers that are causing trouble in Japan. In the US we probably bludgeon (or shoot) those people on the spot and lawyers talk later, but Japan doesn’t do that, not even their police. Majority of Japanese just sit there silently but deep inside filled with disgust.

Besides, once these laws are implemented, soon it will be obvious which groups are “targeted” and it doesn’t look good in the eyes of the international world.

Okay so which specific cultural religious and ethnic backgrounds are causing trouble and what empirical evidence do you have of this happening on a large scale? It can take many generations for immigrant family to assimilate into the host country's culture, how do you know they are there to conquer and not just taking time to assimilate? Why do you think only Japanese people can take care of Japan, do you hold this belief for other countries?

If you broadly link the flavors of Christianity practiced in Russia and the evangelical side of the US I guess you could make a claim about white Christians causing a lot of trouble worldwide with military attacks on other countries...

Go back to countries in the same religious/ethnic tree meddling in the Middle East in the early and mid-20th-century and you can link back a whole host more problems to white Christians!

But the southern evangelical side of my family gets pretty upset whenever I point that out...

If I were to guess, I'd guess it's Islam. I come from a region where we have a sizeable Muslim minority, and hardly a day goes by without some outrage or the other which hurts their sensibilities (ban calls for prayers? ban praying in the middle of the street during rush hour? serve bacon/ham in school lunches? etc. etc.); regardless of the fact that people have lived this way for millennia, and Muslims just showed up in the last few decades, but insist on bending the rest of the society to their norms.

Okay so which specific cultural religious and ethnic backgrounds are causing trouble and what empirical evidence do you have of this happening on a large scale?

Feigning to not know, is knowing.

This sounds like social media driven hysteria. No evidence. No statistics. Just vibes pushed by those with a political axe to grind.

In a time of declining globalism and growing[1] nationalism[2] and anti-immigration sentiment around the world, I think it is unsurprising that a historically[3] xenophobic culture would move in this direction.

[1]: https://thesociopedia.blogspot.com/2026/07/why-nationalism-i...

[2]: often used as a tool by oligarchy to shift blame away from themselves, instead towards vulnerable groups, as the cause of rising inequality and various institutional crisis

[3]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Racism_in_Japan

Let's be honest, the Japanese gov't has killed off every generation since the asian bubble popped in the 90's. Those kids in the 90's that still can't get a job should be in their peak earning years and have strong talent skills, (and having kids) which was all sacrificed. They don't have the skills or tax base they should and they are unwilling to actually fix it because the stock market needs to crash big time and the rich need to pay for it.

I moved from the USA to Sweden about 6 years ago. Sweden has also been tightening its immigration laws, in ways I believe have been and will be detrimental to its future.

Countries have a right to change their laws, but I believe it’s in everyone’s interest for those laws to be changed while respecting principles of predictability and legal certainty.

People planned and rearranged their entire lives around immigration law in force at one point, perhaps 5 years ago, and now a new law is going into force that slams the door shut to having a basic sense of stability, with only a 6 month transition period. It’s cruel. And it sends a bad sign to anyone looking to move.

The USA can afford to be cruel because people will deal with it for high wages. Japan can maybe afford to be cruel because their cultural exports keep the top of their “talent attraction” funnel large. It’s economic suicide for any other small-to-medium sized nation dependent on foreign labor.

I moved from the USA to Sweden about 6 years ago. Sweden has also been tightening its immigration laws

Context for others: Until 2026 Sweden had no language, income, employment, or skills requirement for citizenship. It now has some basic requirements in these areas.

* 2025 citizenship requirements: <https://web.archive.org/web/20250315034218/https://www.migra...>

* 2026: <https://www.migrationsverket.se/English/Private-individuals/...>

in ways I believe have been and will be detrimental to its future.

In completely unrelated news, Arabic is now the second most spoken language in Sweden after Swedish. <http://web.archive.org/web/20210511231225/https://digitaledi...>.

Also completely unrelated: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_grenade_attacks_in_Swe...

"Arabic" is hundreds of different languages.

It's like saying "anglosaxon" and grouping english, german, swedish, danish, norwegian as one single language.

If English, German, Swedish, etc. shared a single prestige form, which all educated speakers understand and use for formal purposes, I think it would be reasonable and common to call them dialects of "Germanic".

More generally, you'll drive yourself crazy trying to form an opinion of what a language "really" is independent of what the people who use it believe. Norwegian people can generally read Danish, and Danish people can generally read Norwegian if it's written in Bokmål, but Bokmål is only one of the two equally valid ways to write Norwegian. What's going on there? You can trample over the cultural context to impose some abstract definition of what's "really" a language, or you can accept that Norwegian is a language because Norwegian speakers say so and not worry too much about the metaphysical status of Nynorsk.

It’s economic suicide for any other small-to-medium sized nation dependent on foreign labor.

This such a baffling statement, honestly: that the flourishing economy crucially depends on foreign labour. What happened with the role of the technological know-how, and vast material (and financial) capital? The institutions? All of that is still not enough for prosperity unless you can hire a paperless José for $7.40 per hour, with an implied threat of handing him off to ICE if he raises any stink?

Most developed countries are quickly losing population. The ones that have a slight deviation from that trend is due to immigration.

Foreign labor is what will keep most of these countries afloat for the following 50 years.

Japan is a good example, they lose about 1 million every year.

Most of developed economies dont need blue collar foreign labor in the future. Some dont even need it now. There are no industries in uk or france and this labor role is mostly to suppress wages (we ve seen it with brexit and english truck drivers) . For industrial nations like germany before they shot themselves you do need this labor until robots and automation makes them obsolete. Way before 50years and then being a nation with low immigration is becoming a key advantage for a country cohesion and future. Finally every country at 25% youth unemployment (like france and spain) shoould block all immigration beside highly skilled immigrants

Robots and automation won’t replace health care workers. Aging countries will need more of those.

And the unemployed youth would be working those low skilled jobs today if they wanted to, fact is they don’t pay enough for them and if those jobs are automated away they will still be unemployed.

It obviously suppress wages, which is a necessary condition for capitalism. Any country where it costs 10x to build infrastructure because there is no cheap labor will be less competitive.

Healthcare robots will ve there in less than 15y. Also boomers are the wealthiest generation in history they can afford a native healthcare worker

This comment make no sense. You know a large portion of aged Japanese have to worked because there are shortage of blue collar workers right?

When a person migrates, I would believe that the origin country has one less population. So why is it good that this person props up population in the destination country instead of in the origin country?

And why does the destination country need that persons labour and expertise, but not the origin country?

If the native population is becoming exterminated with or without migration, what exactly is the "country" that needs to be kept "afloat"? Your stock portfolio? Your treasury bills? Your real estate investment?

It’s definitely a possibility that a country dwindles away and is happy to do so in order to avoid immigration. We’ll probably see that with Japan and South Korea by the end of this century.

Ultimately it’s their choice.

Whether a country with high population composed of immigration is still the same country we can look to the Americas. Countries with extreme high degree of immigration and assimilation, yet still very much worthwhile countries. Maybe not the countries the natives from 500 years ago would have imagined, but their culture has survived more than 100 years and contribute significantly to the world still. New Zealand is also a good example of native culture not being wiped out even with assimilation.

The fate of the native North Americans is one of the largest catastrophes in the history of humanity. Just as so many other times through human history when natives were displaced and replaced, whether by violent or non-violent means, or a mix of both.

Immigration doesn't change the fact of natives dwindling away or not. A nation is the native people, not a name on a map. The exceptions are the United States and other new world ex-colonies. But there was a very dear price paid in blood and tears to make them.

America has had almost no assimilation of immigrants into the cultures which existed there before. Very good arguments have been made that the Enlightenment (or Age of Reason) did originate from native North American ideas and ideals being brought to Europe through cultural exchange, but it's not assimilation on the part of the settlers.

Interesting! Could you point us towards where the "Very good arguments have been made that the Enlightenment (or Age of Reason) did originate from native North American ideas and ideals" can be found?

You don't have a automatic right to live in another country in my opinion. I don't blame Swedes for slamming a door shut that has turned their incredibly safe country into the gun and bomb capital of Europe.

Japan can maybe afford to be cruel because their cultural exports keep the top of their “talent attraction” funnel large

I am fascinated by others being fascinated with Japan (meta fascination?). It’s like this mythical land of milk and honey for some. I don’t get? It’s just another country amongst hundred others.

Anti-immigration laws: angry face

Anti-immigration laws, Japan: happy face

As usual, the meme is ever alive around these parts. Anything Japan does is heralded as a good move™ and no impartial discussion can be had without the weeaboos coming out of the woodwork to put a positive spin on it.

But sure, we’ll see if limiting these odious gaijin coming in will solve their stagnant economy, fertility crisis and obsolete business practices. Good luck with their isolationism, it’s not the first time they’ve gone down that path, all to appease the right-leaning imbeciles that blame the immigrant for their politicians’ ineptitude at dealing with systemic problems. It’s the same all over the world.

I just find it odd so many non-Japanese media and commentators weigh in on this.

Japan is not a multicultural country. You can't become Japanese through paperwork. It is very much through blood heritage, your language and cultural proficiency.

The bar to be Japanese is much higher than say Canadian or French. So why shouldn't they create laws that is aimed at benefiting themselves and their country without depending on foreigners?

Also if you have a business and you don't have $125,000 you are not going to make it in Canada or America either.

I just find it odd so many non-Japanese media and commentators weigh in on this

What is odd about it? People comment on every country immigration policies. Why would Japan get a special exemption

People comment on every country [sic] immigration policies

That's the world as it is, not necessarily as it should be. Not being a citizen of the country in question, or part of the culture, and most importantly, not being one of the people that deals with the consequences of whichever choice is made, means your opinion counts for so little as to be barely worth sharing

So, who or what organization authorizes your opinions?

Also if you have a business and you don't have $125,000 you are not going to make it in Canada or America either.

I had less than $10k to my name when I moved to Canada. I have done very well since.

I have done very well since

How about Canada? Did it become better or worse since then?

I was born Canada. Lived here my whole life. I'm ~40ish years old

It's absolutely become worse since the 80s

I get a lot of shit from my fellow countrymen when I say it. Rose colored glasses, etc

But nah. It's way harder to be successful here than it was even 20 years ago

This is just true everywhere though.

Not, it's not. Most of asian countries got better in the last 20 years

It feels normal in a globalized world for commentators around the globe to observe and weigh in on the decisions of any country, especially one of such economic importance and cultural significance as Japan.

That being said, I wholeheartedly agree on your points regarding Japan not being a multi-cultural country. And this, indeed, is rarely (if ever) mentioned in articles such as the one posted here.

Japan is an island. It has always been and not just from a geographical perspective. Its very culture and history are ones of isolation. The restrictions are not new, the perspective "Japan first" is not new - these have always been there, they are at the very core of the nation.

Through blood heritage ?

Explain why the blood is needed. Is it perhaps because Japan uses a different type of oxygen that needs different hemoglobin?

Dude ethnically Japanese people that were born in Japan, lived their entire childhoods in Japan, are no longer considered Japanese if they live outside of Japan for 5-10 years.

People who have lived their entire lives in Japan, but are not 100% ethnically Japanese, will literally never be accepted as Japanese.

Doesn't seem they're really aware that they're something of an endangered "species". Although technically they'd still be endangered even if they open up seriously, as then there's heightened possibility of bloodline dilution. I wonder sometimes if that'd be a good or bad thing in the long run: loss of that which makes them pretty unique vs blending more with the world.

heightened possibility of bloodline dilution

In my experience, born/raised in Japan, domestic Japanese people have a very different reaction to local "Hafu" people where one of their parents is a Caucasian person from the US, UK, AU, NZ (or similar), vs "other" countries.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H%C4%81fu

Colonial mentalities carry on for decades.

I mean, Japan's experience with colonialism was decidedly on the colonist side: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greater_East_Asia_Co-Prosperit...

I have a personal unscientific theory that some of it, domestically within Japan, is as simple as a heightened degree of racism towards people with darker skin color.

From research I've learned that placing a high value on blending in is a cultural thing. There's the resulting good, like the focus on harmony which promotes good relationships (and is a major contributor to the low crime rate), and there's the bad, like spurning those who look/speak different (I've heard stories from a few who went to visit seeing signs that gaijin aren't allowed in certain establishments, etc).

“Bloodline dilution” is only a thing if you believe your race is superior.

I'm pretty sure there are many non-Japanese who're attracted to Japanese primarily because of their homogeneity.

You mean western dudes who fetishize/exotify eastern women?

or if you just care about your race, which is a normal thing to do

it's an extended family of sorts

Hot take: I think immigration and multiculturalism is going to be the the biggest and the defining issue of this century. The history books will have "AI" and climate change in the margins as 'exacerbating factors'. We've started to see it in the US, and we're beginning to see the start to it in the EU. Japan--rightly or wrongly--might be averting a future disaster here. Japan is lucky in that they are still a very homogeneous society, and also unlucky in that they are ahead of the curve in population decline. I think the western world is in for a bad time over the next 50 years.

What disaster is Japan averting?

"they took our jobs!"

more like “they didn’t follow the rules and destroyed our nice society and dumped garbage everywhere”

I think Japan thinks they can still attract enough foreigners to perform necessary service and manual labor jobs without the promise of permanent residency. That along with increasing automation - serving robots are a common sight at many restaurants these days, for example.

Permanent residency is reserved for those who can be a net benefit to social welfare programs - by earning and contributing more than the average Japanese household (about USD $36,000 - $42,000 according to google). There are also new language requirements to promote assimilation.

I don’t think it’s anything too radical by global standards, and I have read there are similarities to what Singapore and South Korea already do [1] (though I don’t know too much about their programs).

It’s important to note that the exact details haven’t been finalized yet. So exact income requirements could change from current proposals/rumors. There was a lot of outrage about proposed provisions to revoke permanent residency for people who commit crimes or don’t pay taxes, but when they actually came through they were pretty fair, common sense type changes.

These changes come on the heels of drastically increasing requirements for the business manager visa (which, to be fair, was heavily abused as a kind of “golden visa” in the past). They’ve also significantly increased visa application costs - I think I paid like ¥5,000 for my PR application, and it is now ¥200,000.

It does feel cruel to apply new requirements retroactively to people who have already submitted applications. And the stories of people whose lives are being completely upended by the changes are heartbreaking.

[1] https://www.japantimes.co.jp/commentary/2026/09/21/japan/jap...

Japan has a heavy shortage of workers [0], and it has been so for many years now. Your link cites the efforts from 2017, the reason wasn't some olive branch to humanity, Japan already was in dire need of working class people.

Right now the yen is so weak Japan salary look ridiculously low, there is the language barrier, and the low hanging jobs aren't great either (a ton in elderly care).

Their policies to restrict immigration will have few impact short term, as immigration is already slowing down and even Filinos, who have always been on the better side of immigration, are looking for better opportunities [1]. Longer term though, people will remember how it goes when Japan economy trends down, and the immigration going away might not come back even when the trend reverses. Especially as there will already be a probably better community built elsewhere.

[0] https://jp.ibtimes.com/japans-full-time-labor-shortages-pers...

[1] https://www.bangkokpost.com/world/3309634/why-filipino-migra...

To put that in perspective, US companies report similar rates of worker shortages in surveys [1]:

The survey found that company size influenced hiring outcomes. Seventy-six percent of companies with 1,000 to 4,999 employees reported shortages, followed by 75% of firms with 5,000 employees or more and 74% of those with 250 to 999 employees. Among smaller firms, 69% of organizations with 50 to 249 employees, 66% with 10 to 49 employees and 61% with fewer than 10 employees reported hiring challenges.

I'm not saying that there isn't a shortage of labor in Japan - just that business owners are never satisifed with the amount of labor available at the wages they wish to pay. And it may not be an existential shortage of labor like a lot of commenters are saying. Especially with recent developments in AI and automation.

The declining birthrate in general does seem to be an existential issue if it cannot be stabilized. But it is hard to predict population trends long term (when I was growing up the big concern was overpopulation and China was running its one-child policy - now they are facing population decline).

The weak yen is also definitely an issue right now - but it's impossible to predict where it will be in the future.

So yes, Japan is facing real problems. And stricter immigration requirements likely will come at some cost to economic output. But if they feel it is necessary to protect their social welfare programs and cultural identity, then those tradeoffs are theirs to make. And all of the doom and gloom comments saying things like "it's suicide" feel like a bit of an overreaction to me when you look at the actual proposed changes.

[1] https://www.staffingindustry.com/news/global-daily-news/69-o...

The requirements are essentially that you're either upper-middle class or better from a developed country (or a resource rich one like those in the Middle East) or from the ultra-wealthy of a developing/underdeveloped one, and you put in enough effort to learn the language. I doubt the ultra-wealthy will really be required to have language proficiency in practice. This is basically to gatekeep all but the wealthiest black, brown and "lesser" Asian peoples as expected of Japan, but the 30 years savings requirement will keep at bay quite a few white people who may have dreamed about immigrating there too. I don't wish the Japanese people ill, but I hope they'll find some solution for all those aging, near-destitute, and sometimes abandoned elderly folks instead of telling them to suck it up for the sake of cultural identity.

Side note, but it's always funny to me that whenever (and frequently) Japanese immigration policies are discussed on sites like HN and Reddit, there seems to always be a large number of clearly white people from America and Europe coming in to display their Japanese nationalism.

but the wealthiest

News flash, poor people are not wanted in most countries of the world, everyone already has their own poor population to deal with.

everyone already has their own poor population to deal with

Yikes, that is quite the dehumanizing framing

Edit: A person commented "why?" before deleting their comment, which I had started responding to. I still want to give my response:

Because an enlightened government is for the people (and an unenlightened government is not worth having). The purpose of a government is to care for the welfare of the people, not to be the securer of private wealth for the wealthy. The above comment frames it as "dealing with" an undesirable population. That population is the people, and it is a perversion to think otherwise.

How? It seems realistic, not brutal (though reality is a bit brutal).

Edit: Your update seems unrelated. I can't connect it to what the parent said. They said it's hard to accept the poor of other nations when you are busy supporting your own poor, and you responded as if they said we should not support even our own poor, in favor of supporting the wealthy. There's no connection there.

They said it's hard to accept the poor of other nations when you are busy supporting your own poor

The original comment did not say what you claim.

The original comment framed it as “dealing with” the poor population. That is bad framing. The role of government is to take care of the people, not to “deal with” them. That framing is important because the people are not a problem to be dealt with. They are to be protected and cared for. The framing is important because it dictates what is accepted and what gets done.

Poor people are a problem, they eat through resources without replenishing them, how you deal with them is another thing. Apparently you think dealing with them means something nefarious, which speaks more about you to be honest.

Poor people should be enabled to have the tools to go and have better lives, but it’s up to them, what’s better for you might not be for them, so they can only choose. It’s called free will.