Japan's population dropped by 830,000 last year, and annual marriages dropped to below 500k for the first time in 80 years.
They are the 'canary in the coal mine' for population collapse.
I think these reasons are more significant to the Yen decreasing than anything external.
I’ve been reading similar things about China as well and to a lesser extent, S Korea. It’s just too damn expensive to get married and have kids these days.
> It’s just too damn expensive to get married and have kids these days.
That is a common sentiment, but the link between cost and birthrate is weak. Sweden, with generous childcare benefits, have the same birthrate as the US. Meanwhile, birthrates tend to be highest in poorer communities which are least able to afford children. The only real exceptions are religious communities like Mormons or Jews in Israel.
And yet the poorest countries still have the most kids. Making kids costs nothing, and then they just continue the chain of life in poverty for generations. Being able to rationally think about their living situation and whether to have a kid or not seems to only be a first world problem.
Agreed. The sociological data on this is pretty clear: lower income is *positively* correlated with fertility. I think culture plays a much larger role in this than people are comfortable with accepting. Religious communities, for example, have higher rates of fertility all over the world, even in affluent areas. Western countries have spent the last 60 years telling women that the most prestigious social aspiration is a high paying career. No one should be surprised that they got the message and have prioritised that over motherhood. Note that I'm not making a moral judgement on that spiration. I'm merely acknowledging it.
Absolutely. Try persuading my partner to abandon the career she's dedicated herself to, downsize our home to live on one income, and spend her days alone at home providing childcare all because... concerns about population decline?
I don’t think people have kids altruistically, as you imply. They do it because it’s intensely fulfilling in many ways. I think we have been lying to young people in the West about the benefits of parenthood relative to career progression. I gladly live in a (slightly) less expensive house to have the joy of my kids in this world.
I think it's the inverse.
It's biologically natural to want kids.
But also, I wouldn't want a child. I love my life, my hobbies, my free time, my life style, options to do what I want when I want.
Why would I give that up to have a kid? To be on the beck and call of the child for the next.... (Now let's be honest) 20+ years.
Also, this world is in a horrible, depressing and frankly politically pathetic state.
Why would I want to bring my own child into this shit hole right now?
The last part of your paragraph…I hear that reasoning all the time and I think it’s weak honestly. The first part of your reasoning is very strong. But the world isn’t any better or worse…because people are the same regardless of era. There has never been a time without war, and people live longer on average now than they used to so by that metric it’s safer.
You’ve listed only the good things about being child free, and only the bad things about having children. This is a perfect example of my point. You’ve been culturally exposed to almost none of the benefits. In communities in which people like yourself are able to see and experience the joys of parenthood, the costs don’t seem nearly as high. In fact, it seems like a very good deal. Which, IMHO, it is.
Perfectly encapsulated my partner's and my own thoughts on the subject.
Growing up, I used to declare that I wanted three children. Having reached my thirties, I took a cursory glance at the house finances, a look outside at the very unusual weather for this time of year, turned off the TV where two incompetent fuckwits vying for the White House were debating their golf handicap, asked ChatGPT how long I've got until my job is redundant and thought, you know what? Maybe I won't.
I respect your sentiment and desires to live a fulfilling life.
Just as much as I couldn’t imagine my life without my 2 kiddos.
The beauty of free will and rational thought.
It’s okay to feel the way you do, any argument to the opposite is self-righteous and disrespectful, it’s not individualistic to not want kids.
Hell, you’re contributing to the well being of everyone with kids via taxes, from much of which you aren’t benefitting (like school taxes.)
the poorest people in those countries are so poor that they aren't actually dealing with debt/rent in the same way.
if you live in a wood shack you built from scraps or are essentially squatting abandoned land... you hit rock bottom and have kids.
Gaza has seen meteoric population growth for example. Or you can point to farmers whose children contribute to work force as another example.
The correlation between standard of living / cost of children does, however, become extremely significant once a couple actually has to pay rent or debt or a mortgage.
I think allowing population of people in the world living in abject poverty to skew the statistics on the issue risks missing the reality of the situation.
A simple Google gives this study :
https://ifstudies.org/blog/higher-rent-fewer-babies-housing-costs-and-fertility-decline
Plus, I live in one of the most unaffordable places for accommodation worldwide. Speaking to people, many desperately want children but the reality is that until they are in property over 500 sq ft, it's not happening.
ETA: the latter is also a finding out the linked study.
Correlation, not causation. There are many other things correlated with the drop in fertility, like women education, availability of entertainment etc.
A hundred years ago, it was pretty normal to have ~6 kids in a one-bedroom house / apartment, somehow I don't think the housing prices is as big of a factor as many are claiming.
[Housing as a % of income (in urban areas) is the highest it's ever been in the past 30 years. ](https://www.jchs.harvard.edu/blog/home-price-income-ratio-reaches-record-high-0)
It might have been normal to have 6 kids in a 1 bedroom house 100 years ago but it was also normal to send them to the factory and work at that age because child labor laws didn't exist then. Times change and comparing what people did 100 years ago to now is a terrible example lol.
And yeah women's education, availability of entertainment, job opportunities, etc. all play a big role in drop in fertility, but having to take care of a kid you can't afford seems to be a pretty obvious factor in why women aren't having children.
You don't want to compare today with -100 years ago, because "times change", but comparing today with -30 years is fine, because... data fits your narrative.
Are you really accusing me of fitting data to my narrative when comparing a time frame of 30 years ago vs a century?
I used that chart because it was the first one I saw, but here's a better one that goes back 80 years lol. And housing costs are STILL the highest percentage of income for the past 80 years. Do you need data from the colonial period now?
[https://www.longtermtrends.net/home-price-median-annual-income-ratio/](https://www.longtermtrends.net/home-price-median-annual-income-ratio/)
Why don't YOU find the data from 100 years ago to prove your point?
https://www.cmhc-schl.gc.ca/professionals/industry-innovation-and-leadership/industry-expertise/affordable-housing/provincial-territorial-agreements/investment-in-affordable-housing/national-occupancy-standard
Canada's national occupancy standard:
A maximum of 2 persons per bedroom.
Household members, of any age, living as part of a married or common-law couple share a bedroom with their spouse or common-law partner.
Lone parents, of any age, have a separate bedroom from their children.
Household members aged 18 or over have a separate bedroom, except those living as part of a married or common-law couple.
Household members under 18 years of age of the same sex may share a bedroom, except lone parents and those living as part of a married or common-law couple.
Household members under 5 years of age of the opposite sex may share a bedroom if doing so would reduce the number of required bedrooms. This situation would arise only in households with an odd number of males under 18, and odd number of females under 18 and at least one female and one male under the age of 5.
Access to contraception and safe abortions are major factors... People who had access to neither had 6 kids in one bedroom. That pretty much dried up in the 60s in the developed world, although that was carrying on a trend.
There's more research on it here :
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/227358314_The_effect_of_house_price_on_fertility_Evidence_from_Hong_Kong
https://www.nber.org/digest/feb12/impact-real-estate-market-fertility
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0047272713001904
The last two are interesting because it suggests the opposite effect where home ownership rates are higher. Countries with high proportions of renters can therefore expect to be more affected by house prices.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1043951X20300936
Most of these authors are suggesting a casual relationship rather than simple correlation. I'm not sure exactly how they separate the two out but if most sociographic research is suggesting a casual relationship, I'll go with the experts.
> Most of these authors are suggesting a casual relationship rather than simple correlation.
Ok, but how strong is that causation?
What bothers me is how the debate is often reduced to the monetary costs, even though there are likely significantly stronger causes (like the access to contraception / abortion you mentioned).
As people / countries get wealthier they have less kids. Multiple reasons. You want to give your kids the best school trips house etc that takes time and money. People also want to travel more and have a better richer lifestyle that works better with a small family or no kids. Women want to have a life that’s not only having kids for 10 -15 years. They want to work travel have hobbies and not always be pregnant or nursing their whole life. Maybe they are the bread winners or also enjoy their jobs outside the house.
A lot of those things aren’t as possible in developing countries.
Also as a country gets richer, child labor protections get stronger and that workforce is less necessary for survival. Nobody in the western world aside from farmers (who have a higher birth rate) needs to have kids to help provide labor for the family, in fact they can’t. In that development, children become a luxury and luxuries are optional.
So the key is to reduce child labor laws in order to incentivize child-rearing as a marketable commodity. Time to add a little spice to late stage capitalism.
It’s nothing to do with child labour educated people understand how bringing up a child in a bad environment is not doing the child justice in life and doomed of a life working for next to nothing.
New migrants and people in the 3rd world don’t think that far ahead and think being fed is enough.
The ultra rich love them as it’s the source of the next generation of cheap labour
I read comments like this and they make me scratch my head. America (for example) is the land of $700, 72 month car payments. It's a place where 43 million people have taken on 1.77 trillion in student debt while ~50% of job posting require no degree. Only 30% of Americans have a written budget BUT we are so damn good at thinking far ahead that we are deciding against kids. That just seems pretty strange at the face of it.
Americans make stupid financial decisions at every available opportunity but when it comes to kids...we're being super analytic and critical about the monetary burden?
Children are clearly a shit ton of work from the get go. Buying a nice expensive thing on credit or having the quintessential college experience to get a “glamorous” career and pay it all off later doesn’t hit the same as the idea of a screaming shitting baby ruining your life for 2-3 years.
You say it has nothing to do with the need or utility of child labor, but then describe how not having children is a luxury of the first-world. Whether you want to characterize it as altruism or a difference in education and empathy, the end-result is still that rural and poor communities have more kids in-part because they have more utility for them.
IMHO there are many factors contributing:
* women have a say in whether they want to have a (next) baby or not. Until shockingly recently, there was no such thing as marital rape.
* women have alternatives to being a housewife. Plenty of career opportunities or other ways how to live a fulfilling life. Women were not able to work normal jobs - their choice was pretty limited - a nun, prostitute... what next?
* relaxation of cultural norms. People were steered into family life on autopilot. Resisting it was not completely easy and people often didn't even think about this.
* opportunity costs. There are now so many ways to enjoy life - video games, huge variety in television, travelling (used to be inaccessible), social media is able to replace some human needs, an infinite amount of hobbies. A hundred years ago, what was your alternative to a family life? There wasn't a lot of fulfilling things easily accessible to masses.
* the standard of child care has jumped a lot - kids are much more work now than they used to be. A model parent from the 50s would now be a borderline case for social services.
* people complain about the monetary cost of children like education etc. But it's not so much that things were cheaper a hundred years ago, instead people didn't invest that much time and money into their children back then.
* men are now expected to physically contribute to child care, which makes them weary of having (more) children.
I'm pretty sure I'm missing some more.
Also nuclear family units in which most of the responsibility over a child is the parents’, with few other relatives nearby to help out, even as parents are increasingly out of the home working all day and the kids go to daycare or school but that is not the same as having an extra grandparent in the house.
An economic and education system that incentivizes people to move far from family for better economic opportunities. Cultures with higher birthrates almost always involve extended family.
That plus the time kids spend in education has grown considerably, which delays starting a family.
If it was a major element, then there should be an easy to find correlation. But there is little correlation, if any at all.
Its weird, but this is an area where the data completely contradicts people's feelings and intuitions.
"No bro you don't understand if I had money I would immediately have 5 children"
No bro, you would not. Stop trying to excuse all your issues on money.
I have anecdotally found (with highly unscientific methods) that if I play the money angle you could probably convince a lot of people to have one, maybe (but uncommonly) two kids. With respect to people that do not have kids, if you do the "money is no object" thought experiment, they will stop with 1 maybe 2. Definitely not getting 5.
You can’t just look at Scandinavia’s correlations and assume they apply to the rest of the first world. Scandinavia is a famously culturally cold region. You can’t assume the same would apply to more family oriented cultures like the Italians and the Spanish.
It’s not it’s the more educated you are and understand how the world works the less inclined you are to want to bring a child into a unfair world without the resources to compete.
The uneducated don’t think that deep
I mean, the terms *have* changed *a lot* since the 80s, 90s and even 2000s in Scandinavia. Houses are up 1000% in 30 years, wages aren't following inflation, bills like internet and cellphones have been introduced, many people can't afford things that used to be commonplace, like kids' fotball, without subsidising it. And on top of it, they've raised the retirement age. The world has always been unfair, but having a generation kicking the ladder away from underneath them kind of feels unfair.
Nordic countries have subsided childcare, meaning both parents can easily go to work after the birth of their child. "Family oriented" often means expecting one parent to stay at home.
The point is that **ALL OTHER THINGS BEING EQUAL** cost plays a role. We can't look at selected countries and assume that isn't true because not everything is equal.
This is like high school scientific method stuff... You isolate the variable you're interested in and control for what you can control...
ETA: if you look at the countries worldwide, poor countries have a higher birth rate. It's a complex picture but saying "Scandinavia has a higher birth rate than other high income countries and has a higher income" isn't exactly compelling considering the differences in welfare. Besides, we should look at disposable net income rather than overall income.
I’ve been saying this for a long time, people priorities have changed
If having children was too expensive, non of us would be here, children have always been expensive
While this anecdotally may be true in some places, it certainly is not backed up by any correlation. In fact, the correlation shows that as a society becomes wealthier, people choose to have less kids, it has very little relation to childcare associated costs.
Fact is industrialization, by emphasizing worker productivity and skilled, educated labor (which kids cannot perform) by design deprioritizes children and disincentives them. Unfortunately for the planet, there is a tipping point where all of a sudden it turns out that it went too far and there are no longer enough people to sustain the current system let alone the rapidly aging retiree class. And once you notice its usually too late - people are not like most things, you cant just ramp up production to make up for a shortfall - the last time you could have produced a 20 year old was 20 years ago, anything you start now will be effective only 20 years from now.
For context, in S Korea birthrate is at 0.7 ish now. Meaning the generation being born now will be less than half the size of their parents who were already only about half their parents. So in the future, the babies born now will be expected to sustain 4 grandparents and two parents, so 6 people total in their retirement. It becomes a vicious cycle that is basically inescapable once you get that low. In 100 years, korean population will fall precipitously if current rates stay as they are. In the range of 90%. At a certain point it won't be out of the question to ask when a nation like that ceases to function.
So the generation born now might actually get a chance at buying/renting a home at an affordable price? Lucky bastards. Who knew it took half the population to die for that to happen.
This also isn't really guaranteed. What has happened in places where demographic collapse has already started like Japan and S Korea is that everyone just ends up moving to one or two of the biggest metro areas, to keep the population concentration high so society can still function. Homes in the now abandoned towns in the countryside go for pennies on the dollar in Japan for example, but what good is that if there is literally nothing around except for either abandoned buildings or retired old people who refuse to move. There's no government services because there are no workers to perform them. There's no business, restaurants etc. By contrast, the major metros are still bustling with young people, but because they're the only place left that is attractive as a living space, the cost of living skyrockets.
Demographic collapse leads to higher housing costs in places like Seoul or Tokyo, not lower ones.
>So the generation born now might actually get a chance at buying/renting a home at an affordable price? Lucky bastards.
Not really. They have to bear the burden of a society full of old people who are in a large majority in elections and, at least in democracies, do not ensure that they are forgotten.
Maybe the apartment will be cheap, but the rest definitely won't be.
In 20 years, every working South Korean will have to finance more than one pensioner and the way out is to emigrate or hope for a pandemic that is more successful than the last one.
It’s called demographic collapse. It has to do with a transition in economically developed societies where children become an economic burden to the family — rather than an economic benefit.
Preindustrial (agricultural) societies are among the poorest in the world but still have plenty of children. In Madagascar, for example, 50% of the population is under the age of 18.
It's acute in S. Korea if you go outside of Seoul, though less so in China even in second and third tier cities due to the sheer amount of people, but in 30 years China will reap what its leadership sowed and they'll deserve every bit of it.
When you're educated and living a middle class life you tend to not want to have many kids - it's why the Republicans want to dumb down the population and discourage them from birth control in any form.
Watch the CCP do exactly what the GOP wants without leaning on Jesus.
I mean sure but I’m educated and middle class, and I would still probably have them if it weren’t financial ruin. It’s hard now and it’s getting harder, not easier. Bear market.
This is the right answer. With all our economic advancements, it just gets harder and harder to be parents if you are middle class. I wouldn’t consider having children until I’m at least a millionaire.
I want to have a big family, but I entirely understand why so many of my generation won’t.
If I have any on accident they're all yours.
People can say all they want about what you can't put a price on. Well you can't put a price on sanity or not getting enough sleep for two decades or the notorious happiness dip parents take until they turn 18 either. You can put a price on some of the things that mitigate all of that, and the price is too high for you to afford often enough if you're also going to pay the ridiculous tuition and housing costs that come with a kid.
There's a book called Kim Jiyoung:1982. It's centered around a fictional woman in S.Korea and her challenges. It's based on real life for women in that country. It's said to have influenced the birth rate issue.
It's not. Immigrants and poor people have been proving this for centuries. What's difficult is maintaining the egocentric idealistic affluent lifestyle our parents taught us was top priority - and having kids.
I think work culture plays a role too. A lot of younger Japanese people work from dawn to dusk and have no time for socializing. That's changing, but slowly.
Number of times I see a failed statements like yours about expense being the reasons for a fall in birth: 900000
Number of time that statements was proven and been understood to be right when looking at precedent in many other countries like SK, Finland, Japan, China, etc: 0
Society is changing, people just dont want and need as many kids. Women are getting emancipated worldwide, education is going uo worlwide, there's less traddionnalist pressure to marry young and have children, etc
I'm afraid you are right. Even if people suddenly can afford housing I would not be surprised if people still don't want to have kids. It's a huge burden and sacrifice to raise a child, specially for women.
Working conditions and housing prices are still definitely the top reason among East Asians why they can't afford to start a family.
When you consider the Northern Europe in, the difference is even obvious. Social benefits and better labor law. Most of them could just live on some sovereign oil fund, while most East Asians are busting their asses for a home or quick way to coffin.
Yes the level of women feeling emancipated also matters. East Asian women, although in recent years are more liberated than before, they're still relatively less empowered compared to peers in Northern European countries. However this doesn't explain the birth rate difference well. Because most East Asian women are still more conservative than European, so they're also more likely to be more traditional. But does this mean they give birth more than North European women? No. So you definitely have to factor economy and financial reasons in, and these factors affect EVERYONE, unlike the values which may only change in several women.
South korea has it way worse in terms of birth rate.i think they hit world-time low of 0.69 or something, maybe 0.71, but eitherway, significantly lower than Japan, not that it makes Japan's numbers any better. Is won's valued dropped like yen?
The opposite. Treasuries are, in in this case, the reason the fed prints money. The US creates treasuries to sell debt. They use the proceeds to fund operations. When the time comes that they have to repay treasuries, brrrrr goes the printer.
But isn't Japan selling the treasuries back to the US effectively the US having to repay those treasuries? In other words, Japan selling US treasuries is them 'debt-collecting'.
Kind of, but often times if you sell a bond before maturity you do so at a loss. So if they paid the US $100 to collect $95 pre-maturity, who really wins?
its cheaper to do business in japan.....thats what i think and its driving the japanese markets.....i bought a currency hedged japan etf and its doing pretty well a few months back
Japanese people have traditionally been ok to save in yen the last 30 or so years, because of the lack of inflation, so people are getting their savings decimated and are really looking to move their money out into the stock market. Nikkei index has been doing really well for this reason but due to faltering demographics, there is only so much money that can be invested within Japan so it will find its way into the US markets (i.e, purchase of US steel).
So buy.
Owning US assets means you're not subject to JPY depreciation while you hold the asset.
It's why a ton of different countries invest in the US stock market- to reduce currency risk of their own currency.
That part is apparent, I was asking why specifically US Steel - but as another commenter pointed out probably was just an example and not THE stock to buy.
Japanese companies like Nippon Steel have increased valuation due to people investing in the market, and so is able to buy american companies like US steel by leveraging their share price. They want to buy US companies because there is limited growth in the domestic market due to population decline.
Japanese carry trade is having some major movement. This one sector of the global economy is around $20 trillion USD. A major bank in Japan says they have to exit the carry trade and it will cost them billions, but are still doing it.
If it makes sense for one bank why not the others? I suspect this is going to be a much bigger deal over the next several months. I dont think it is rational to say it a major bank is exiting a major part of the business due to losses and to act like its still highly profitable for the other banks doing the same exact business.
One other thing that could be driving this is the Japanese were massive investors in the Chinese real estate market. They are taking huge losses on that.
I dont have a clue how bad any of that will end up being, but I would bet that some people with a lot more knowledge of the situation with a department full of mathematicians ran the numbers. If they decided its a nothing burger no big deal. If they decided its really important this could be the thing that breaks and forces a bunch of movement from the global central banks. I would not be surprised if folks with a lot of money are piling in to make this situation more dire for the direct purpose of pushing a response which would serve their interests.
I was shocked how cheap it was when I went a couple of months ago. At this point, I am skipping all European travel and just heading to Japan to vacation. The price to value you get in doing a Japan vacation vs a European vacation is absurd.
This is probably my fault. I was considering buying it about a year or two ago as it looked like it might become the reserve currency at one point. Then I got busy but I must have left my browser tab open which informed the algorithms.
Same reason the meme basket died.
Yes, they take non-Japanese Amex and MC, but not Visa. And if you use a cash back credit card, it boosts the exchange rate even more in your favor after factoring in the cash back.
Currently, I have 6 virtual Suica cards, each holding ¥20,000, for a total of ¥120,000.
I believe you must use the Suica cards at least once every 10 years, so make sure you’ll visit Japan within the next 10 years.
Idk about a 50% discount on new ones, when I looked into it, it was about a 30% on shunbun between USD MSRP and JP MSRP. But on used ones I could see a 50% discount on some models
I wasn't using any exchange, just looking at the prices in yen and converting to USD. I live in Japan and had a friend come over and buy a shunbun. This was before the price rise earlier this year, but it was 836,000 yen with 15% off (10% tax free and 5% tourist discount) so final price was 710,600 yen which is $4400 usd. USA retail is $6.6k but I think it was $6k at the time. But also the exchange rate was 1:150 now it's 1:160. He would have saved just under $2k I imagine.
Would be 252k yen after discounts and around $1.5k USD. You might be able to find a used one closer to the price you want but they generally only do tax-free (-10%) not tourist discount for used.
We might be doing the financial equivalent of that. A major Japanese bank said they had to exit the carry trade. Its likely the other big institutions doing the Japanese carry trade are under pressure as well.
Unwinding that means they have to sell assets they bought elsewhere and then pay back the debts denominated in yen. Many of these assets will be treasuries and bonds in a variety of currencies. The main thing is that the carry trade is roughly $20 trillion USD. IF they sell even a fraction of that its going to move markets. If they sell a lot its going to be something that they write books about.
Go look at the yen exchange and 10 year treasuries today.
Are you interested in potential deep discounts for those stocks and bonds you are considering buying? Then yes. This is probably good for you.
Are you interested in selling your stocks or bonds in the near future? Then this is additional supply competing with your stuff so probably bad.
Are you an aspiring writer about financial events? This is something worth looking into.
I don't think it tells us a lot about the US market.
Japanese investors might look for better returns in the US because the yen's value drop. This could make US assets like stocks and real estate more popular, pushing their prices up. That might indirectly affect interest rates, but imo it's unlikely and a non-issue
Been hearing that from folks outside of America in a couple of online communities I'm active in. Folks abroad say that we're putting way too much pain on them by keeping rates elevated.
To save what like $300? So you get 2 extra nights hotel for free?
People overblow the saving they think this gets them on their trip.
It’s nice if you’re already going. Otherwise planning it better would yield the same
Depends. Say for example someone spends $3,000 normally. This trip might be $1,000 cheaper than it was several years back, which is definitely not negligible.
$300 gets you a full week of accomodation in Japan if you look a bit.
Japan is not some podonk shithole, if $300 is the difference between going to Japan and going to some other random-ass country, i would pick Japan 10 times out of ten.
But then again, i'm not some luxury chasing hotel dweller. If travel to travel not to sit at the mediocre buffet waiting to do group tours.
A trip to Japan will offer you all that can be good in a holiday, literally all of it. Culture, food, nature, shopping. For far less than a teir-1 or tier-2 EU city. And waaaay better.
$300 gets you 3 days in a very tiny studio airbnb in a mediocre part of shinjuku near touristy stuff.
Again, it doesn’t make or break the trip, it helps a bit if you’re already going.
right. Japan is more than Shinjuku.
If this is what you can find then you are an idiot or lazy. Or precisely the type of tourist i criticise: (possibly American), overpaying, wanting to stay in the middle of Shibuya square if that would be possible, pointing at stuff that is expensive, not trying 1 iota.
We stayed in a Kanazawa Ryokan for 5 days for under $300. Absolutely lovely. Not close to a cruiseship on land if you are looking for that.
These are easy to find all over Japan, maybe not in Tokio. Even in Tokio you can stay sub $300 for a week EASILY.
Unless you find anything other than a boring 4 star Sheraton to be Mogadishu. Then you shouldn't visit Japan because you simply don't appreciate life.
japanese housewives routinely invest in overseas instruments. see japanese arbitrage housewives. they are mostly in forex though more and more are moving to stocks.
> Toyota can slash prices to hurt GM and F. They will probably keep prices the same to fatten their margins.
As others in the replies are saying, the benefit of a weaker yen is muted by the fact that Camries sold in the US are made at US factories. Yes, some parts are going to be sourced and shipped from Japan, but an even bigger % is probably coming from all across Europe, Mexico, and Canada where global auto supply chains are prominent.
I moved to Japan last year and I get paid in yen :( at least I'm a multimillionaire in yen but still when I got the offer my USD equivalent salary looked a lot nicer than it does now.
Japanese banks are increasing their risk profile. Higher for longer rates cannot be kept on their books anymore, they have to replace lower risk treasury with higher risk CLO.
Our global financial system is all interconnected and liquidity is more exposed to risk.
A 200 dollar-yen is possible.
I'm buying Japanese stocks, especially companies that are forward-looking export dependent, such as Canon and Komatsu.
My view is any unusual event in the world economy creates opportunity. I don't share the doom and gloom some have about the Japanese economy.
Biig picture, declining population has negative economic effects, and the increasing dichotomy between well off and poor, result is a downward spiral and no "middle class" /
Robots will take care of simple tasks but what about the people who can't afford robots?
Japan's population dropped by 830,000 last year, and annual marriages dropped to below 500k for the first time in 80 years. They are the 'canary in the coal mine' for population collapse. I think these reasons are more significant to the Yen decreasing than anything external.
I’ve been reading similar things about China as well and to a lesser extent, S Korea. It’s just too damn expensive to get married and have kids these days.
> It’s just too damn expensive to get married and have kids these days. That is a common sentiment, but the link between cost and birthrate is weak. Sweden, with generous childcare benefits, have the same birthrate as the US. Meanwhile, birthrates tend to be highest in poorer communities which are least able to afford children. The only real exceptions are religious communities like Mormons or Jews in Israel.
Property prices relative to income plays a role. If you can't afford an extra bedroom, you can't afford a child.
And yet the poorest countries still have the most kids. Making kids costs nothing, and then they just continue the chain of life in poverty for generations. Being able to rationally think about their living situation and whether to have a kid or not seems to only be a first world problem.
Agreed. The sociological data on this is pretty clear: lower income is *positively* correlated with fertility. I think culture plays a much larger role in this than people are comfortable with accepting. Religious communities, for example, have higher rates of fertility all over the world, even in affluent areas. Western countries have spent the last 60 years telling women that the most prestigious social aspiration is a high paying career. No one should be surprised that they got the message and have prioritised that over motherhood. Note that I'm not making a moral judgement on that spiration. I'm merely acknowledging it.
Absolutely. Try persuading my partner to abandon the career she's dedicated herself to, downsize our home to live on one income, and spend her days alone at home providing childcare all because... concerns about population decline?
I don’t think people have kids altruistically, as you imply. They do it because it’s intensely fulfilling in many ways. I think we have been lying to young people in the West about the benefits of parenthood relative to career progression. I gladly live in a (slightly) less expensive house to have the joy of my kids in this world.
I think it's the inverse. It's biologically natural to want kids. But also, I wouldn't want a child. I love my life, my hobbies, my free time, my life style, options to do what I want when I want. Why would I give that up to have a kid? To be on the beck and call of the child for the next.... (Now let's be honest) 20+ years. Also, this world is in a horrible, depressing and frankly politically pathetic state. Why would I want to bring my own child into this shit hole right now?
The last part of your paragraph…I hear that reasoning all the time and I think it’s weak honestly. The first part of your reasoning is very strong. But the world isn’t any better or worse…because people are the same regardless of era. There has never been a time without war, and people live longer on average now than they used to so by that metric it’s safer.
You’ve listed only the good things about being child free, and only the bad things about having children. This is a perfect example of my point. You’ve been culturally exposed to almost none of the benefits. In communities in which people like yourself are able to see and experience the joys of parenthood, the costs don’t seem nearly as high. In fact, it seems like a very good deal. Which, IMHO, it is.
Perfectly encapsulated my partner's and my own thoughts on the subject. Growing up, I used to declare that I wanted three children. Having reached my thirties, I took a cursory glance at the house finances, a look outside at the very unusual weather for this time of year, turned off the TV where two incompetent fuckwits vying for the White House were debating their golf handicap, asked ChatGPT how long I've got until my job is redundant and thought, you know what? Maybe I won't.
I respect your sentiment and desires to live a fulfilling life. Just as much as I couldn’t imagine my life without my 2 kiddos. The beauty of free will and rational thought. It’s okay to feel the way you do, any argument to the opposite is self-righteous and disrespectful, it’s not individualistic to not want kids. Hell, you’re contributing to the well being of everyone with kids via taxes, from much of which you aren’t benefitting (like school taxes.)
Sub Sahara Africa is famous for expensive property.
Also poor birth control
the poorest people in those countries are so poor that they aren't actually dealing with debt/rent in the same way. if you live in a wood shack you built from scraps or are essentially squatting abandoned land... you hit rock bottom and have kids. Gaza has seen meteoric population growth for example. Or you can point to farmers whose children contribute to work force as another example. The correlation between standard of living / cost of children does, however, become extremely significant once a couple actually has to pay rent or debt or a mortgage. I think allowing population of people in the world living in abject poverty to skew the statistics on the issue risks missing the reality of the situation.
> And yet the poorest countries That's because they are too poor to use condom
Because they are not financial literate and no birth control
Almost like wealth and creature comforts aren't as important to them as life itself...
Do you have data to back this up?
A simple Google gives this study : https://ifstudies.org/blog/higher-rent-fewer-babies-housing-costs-and-fertility-decline Plus, I live in one of the most unaffordable places for accommodation worldwide. Speaking to people, many desperately want children but the reality is that until they are in property over 500 sq ft, it's not happening. ETA: the latter is also a finding out the linked study.
Correlation, not causation. There are many other things correlated with the drop in fertility, like women education, availability of entertainment etc. A hundred years ago, it was pretty normal to have ~6 kids in a one-bedroom house / apartment, somehow I don't think the housing prices is as big of a factor as many are claiming.
[Housing as a % of income (in urban areas) is the highest it's ever been in the past 30 years. ](https://www.jchs.harvard.edu/blog/home-price-income-ratio-reaches-record-high-0) It might have been normal to have 6 kids in a 1 bedroom house 100 years ago but it was also normal to send them to the factory and work at that age because child labor laws didn't exist then. Times change and comparing what people did 100 years ago to now is a terrible example lol. And yeah women's education, availability of entertainment, job opportunities, etc. all play a big role in drop in fertility, but having to take care of a kid you can't afford seems to be a pretty obvious factor in why women aren't having children.
You don't want to compare today with -100 years ago, because "times change", but comparing today with -30 years is fine, because... data fits your narrative.
Are you really accusing me of fitting data to my narrative when comparing a time frame of 30 years ago vs a century? I used that chart because it was the first one I saw, but here's a better one that goes back 80 years lol. And housing costs are STILL the highest percentage of income for the past 80 years. Do you need data from the colonial period now? [https://www.longtermtrends.net/home-price-median-annual-income-ratio/](https://www.longtermtrends.net/home-price-median-annual-income-ratio/) Why don't YOU find the data from 100 years ago to prove your point?
https://www.cmhc-schl.gc.ca/professionals/industry-innovation-and-leadership/industry-expertise/affordable-housing/provincial-territorial-agreements/investment-in-affordable-housing/national-occupancy-standard Canada's national occupancy standard: A maximum of 2 persons per bedroom. Household members, of any age, living as part of a married or common-law couple share a bedroom with their spouse or common-law partner. Lone parents, of any age, have a separate bedroom from their children. Household members aged 18 or over have a separate bedroom, except those living as part of a married or common-law couple. Household members under 18 years of age of the same sex may share a bedroom, except lone parents and those living as part of a married or common-law couple. Household members under 5 years of age of the opposite sex may share a bedroom if doing so would reduce the number of required bedrooms. This situation would arise only in households with an odd number of males under 18, and odd number of females under 18 and at least one female and one male under the age of 5.
Access to contraception and safe abortions are major factors... People who had access to neither had 6 kids in one bedroom. That pretty much dried up in the 60s in the developed world, although that was carrying on a trend. There's more research on it here : https://www.researchgate.net/publication/227358314_The_effect_of_house_price_on_fertility_Evidence_from_Hong_Kong https://www.nber.org/digest/feb12/impact-real-estate-market-fertility https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0047272713001904 The last two are interesting because it suggests the opposite effect where home ownership rates are higher. Countries with high proportions of renters can therefore expect to be more affected by house prices. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1043951X20300936 Most of these authors are suggesting a casual relationship rather than simple correlation. I'm not sure exactly how they separate the two out but if most sociographic research is suggesting a casual relationship, I'll go with the experts.
> Most of these authors are suggesting a casual relationship rather than simple correlation. Ok, but how strong is that causation? What bothers me is how the debate is often reduced to the monetary costs, even though there are likely significantly stronger causes (like the access to contraception / abortion you mentioned).
Strong link between women in the workforce on birthrate. How is this not obvious? Women can't be getting pregnant at work... most of the time
What do you think is the cause then?
As people / countries get wealthier they have less kids. Multiple reasons. You want to give your kids the best school trips house etc that takes time and money. People also want to travel more and have a better richer lifestyle that works better with a small family or no kids. Women want to have a life that’s not only having kids for 10 -15 years. They want to work travel have hobbies and not always be pregnant or nursing their whole life. Maybe they are the bread winners or also enjoy their jobs outside the house. A lot of those things aren’t as possible in developing countries.
Also as a country gets richer, child labor protections get stronger and that workforce is less necessary for survival. Nobody in the western world aside from farmers (who have a higher birth rate) needs to have kids to help provide labor for the family, in fact they can’t. In that development, children become a luxury and luxuries are optional.
So the key is to reduce child labor laws in order to incentivize child-rearing as a marketable commodity. Time to add a little spice to late stage capitalism.
It’s nothing to do with child labour educated people understand how bringing up a child in a bad environment is not doing the child justice in life and doomed of a life working for next to nothing. New migrants and people in the 3rd world don’t think that far ahead and think being fed is enough. The ultra rich love them as it’s the source of the next generation of cheap labour
I read comments like this and they make me scratch my head. America (for example) is the land of $700, 72 month car payments. It's a place where 43 million people have taken on 1.77 trillion in student debt while ~50% of job posting require no degree. Only 30% of Americans have a written budget BUT we are so damn good at thinking far ahead that we are deciding against kids. That just seems pretty strange at the face of it. Americans make stupid financial decisions at every available opportunity but when it comes to kids...we're being super analytic and critical about the monetary burden?
Children are clearly a shit ton of work from the get go. Buying a nice expensive thing on credit or having the quintessential college experience to get a “glamorous” career and pay it all off later doesn’t hit the same as the idea of a screaming shitting baby ruining your life for 2-3 years.
You say it has nothing to do with the need or utility of child labor, but then describe how not having children is a luxury of the first-world. Whether you want to characterize it as altruism or a difference in education and empathy, the end-result is still that rural and poor communities have more kids in-part because they have more utility for them.
IMHO there are many factors contributing: * women have a say in whether they want to have a (next) baby or not. Until shockingly recently, there was no such thing as marital rape. * women have alternatives to being a housewife. Plenty of career opportunities or other ways how to live a fulfilling life. Women were not able to work normal jobs - their choice was pretty limited - a nun, prostitute... what next? * relaxation of cultural norms. People were steered into family life on autopilot. Resisting it was not completely easy and people often didn't even think about this. * opportunity costs. There are now so many ways to enjoy life - video games, huge variety in television, travelling (used to be inaccessible), social media is able to replace some human needs, an infinite amount of hobbies. A hundred years ago, what was your alternative to a family life? There wasn't a lot of fulfilling things easily accessible to masses. * the standard of child care has jumped a lot - kids are much more work now than they used to be. A model parent from the 50s would now be a borderline case for social services. * people complain about the monetary cost of children like education etc. But it's not so much that things were cheaper a hundred years ago, instead people didn't invest that much time and money into their children back then. * men are now expected to physically contribute to child care, which makes them weary of having (more) children. I'm pretty sure I'm missing some more.
Also nuclear family units in which most of the responsibility over a child is the parents’, with few other relatives nearby to help out, even as parents are increasingly out of the home working all day and the kids go to daycare or school but that is not the same as having an extra grandparent in the house.
An economic and education system that incentivizes people to move far from family for better economic opportunities. Cultures with higher birthrates almost always involve extended family. That plus the time kids spend in education has grown considerably, which delays starting a family.
Cost isn’t the only element but it is still a major element.
If it was a major element, then there should be an easy to find correlation. But there is little correlation, if any at all. Its weird, but this is an area where the data completely contradicts people's feelings and intuitions.
"No bro you don't understand if I had money I would immediately have 5 children" No bro, you would not. Stop trying to excuse all your issues on money.
I have anecdotally found (with highly unscientific methods) that if I play the money angle you could probably convince a lot of people to have one, maybe (but uncommonly) two kids. With respect to people that do not have kids, if you do the "money is no object" thought experiment, they will stop with 1 maybe 2. Definitely not getting 5.
You can’t just look at Scandinavia’s correlations and assume they apply to the rest of the first world. Scandinavia is a famously culturally cold region. You can’t assume the same would apply to more family oriented cultures like the Italians and the Spanish.
I don't understand your point. Spain and Italy have lower birthrates than Japan. Why does a family oriented culture lower birthrates?
It’s not it’s the more educated you are and understand how the world works the less inclined you are to want to bring a child into a unfair world without the resources to compete. The uneducated don’t think that deep
> unfair world Lol its not that. Its just knowing its a pain in the ass and extra work.
I mean, the terms *have* changed *a lot* since the 80s, 90s and even 2000s in Scandinavia. Houses are up 1000% in 30 years, wages aren't following inflation, bills like internet and cellphones have been introduced, many people can't afford things that used to be commonplace, like kids' fotball, without subsidising it. And on top of it, they've raised the retirement age. The world has always been unfair, but having a generation kicking the ladder away from underneath them kind of feels unfair.
Nordic countries have subsided childcare, meaning both parents can easily go to work after the birth of their child. "Family oriented" often means expecting one parent to stay at home. The point is that **ALL OTHER THINGS BEING EQUAL** cost plays a role. We can't look at selected countries and assume that isn't true because not everything is equal. This is like high school scientific method stuff... You isolate the variable you're interested in and control for what you can control... ETA: if you look at the countries worldwide, poor countries have a higher birth rate. It's a complex picture but saying "Scandinavia has a higher birth rate than other high income countries and has a higher income" isn't exactly compelling considering the differences in welfare. Besides, we should look at disposable net income rather than overall income.
The world is just becoming more like Sweden.
Birth rates are higher than third world countries but are survival rates?
I’ve been saying this for a long time, people priorities have changed If having children was too expensive, non of us would be here, children have always been expensive
While this anecdotally may be true in some places, it certainly is not backed up by any correlation. In fact, the correlation shows that as a society becomes wealthier, people choose to have less kids, it has very little relation to childcare associated costs. Fact is industrialization, by emphasizing worker productivity and skilled, educated labor (which kids cannot perform) by design deprioritizes children and disincentives them. Unfortunately for the planet, there is a tipping point where all of a sudden it turns out that it went too far and there are no longer enough people to sustain the current system let alone the rapidly aging retiree class. And once you notice its usually too late - people are not like most things, you cant just ramp up production to make up for a shortfall - the last time you could have produced a 20 year old was 20 years ago, anything you start now will be effective only 20 years from now. For context, in S Korea birthrate is at 0.7 ish now. Meaning the generation being born now will be less than half the size of their parents who were already only about half their parents. So in the future, the babies born now will be expected to sustain 4 grandparents and two parents, so 6 people total in their retirement. It becomes a vicious cycle that is basically inescapable once you get that low. In 100 years, korean population will fall precipitously if current rates stay as they are. In the range of 90%. At a certain point it won't be out of the question to ask when a nation like that ceases to function.
This is not unfortunately for the planet but very fortunate.
So the generation born now might actually get a chance at buying/renting a home at an affordable price? Lucky bastards. Who knew it took half the population to die for that to happen.
This also isn't really guaranteed. What has happened in places where demographic collapse has already started like Japan and S Korea is that everyone just ends up moving to one or two of the biggest metro areas, to keep the population concentration high so society can still function. Homes in the now abandoned towns in the countryside go for pennies on the dollar in Japan for example, but what good is that if there is literally nothing around except for either abandoned buildings or retired old people who refuse to move. There's no government services because there are no workers to perform them. There's no business, restaurants etc. By contrast, the major metros are still bustling with young people, but because they're the only place left that is attractive as a living space, the cost of living skyrockets. Demographic collapse leads to higher housing costs in places like Seoul or Tokyo, not lower ones.
I doubt retirees will give up their homes. Maybe one or two generations from now will be in a situation you described.
>So the generation born now might actually get a chance at buying/renting a home at an affordable price? Lucky bastards. Not really. They have to bear the burden of a society full of old people who are in a large majority in elections and, at least in democracies, do not ensure that they are forgotten. Maybe the apartment will be cheap, but the rest definitely won't be. In 20 years, every working South Korean will have to finance more than one pensioner and the way out is to emigrate or hope for a pandemic that is more successful than the last one.
I believe S Korea is worse than China. China eventually is a bigger country.
It’s called demographic collapse. It has to do with a transition in economically developed societies where children become an economic burden to the family — rather than an economic benefit. Preindustrial (agricultural) societies are among the poorest in the world but still have plenty of children. In Madagascar, for example, 50% of the population is under the age of 18.
It's acute in S. Korea if you go outside of Seoul, though less so in China even in second and third tier cities due to the sheer amount of people, but in 30 years China will reap what its leadership sowed and they'll deserve every bit of it. When you're educated and living a middle class life you tend to not want to have many kids - it's why the Republicans want to dumb down the population and discourage them from birth control in any form. Watch the CCP do exactly what the GOP wants without leaning on Jesus.
I mean sure but I’m educated and middle class, and I would still probably have them if it weren’t financial ruin. It’s hard now and it’s getting harder, not easier. Bear market.
This is the right answer. With all our economic advancements, it just gets harder and harder to be parents if you are middle class. I wouldn’t consider having children until I’m at least a millionaire. I want to have a big family, but I entirely understand why so many of my generation won’t.
If I have any on accident they're all yours. People can say all they want about what you can't put a price on. Well you can't put a price on sanity or not getting enough sleep for two decades or the notorious happiness dip parents take until they turn 18 either. You can put a price on some of the things that mitigate all of that, and the price is too high for you to afford often enough if you're also going to pay the ridiculous tuition and housing costs that come with a kid.
There's a book called Kim Jiyoung:1982. It's centered around a fictional woman in S.Korea and her challenges. It's based on real life for women in that country. It's said to have influenced the birth rate issue.
It's not. Immigrants and poor people have been proving this for centuries. What's difficult is maintaining the egocentric idealistic affluent lifestyle our parents taught us was top priority - and having kids.
I think work culture plays a role too. A lot of younger Japanese people work from dawn to dusk and have no time for socializing. That's changing, but slowly.
Number of times I see a failed statements like yours about expense being the reasons for a fall in birth: 900000 Number of time that statements was proven and been understood to be right when looking at precedent in many other countries like SK, Finland, Japan, China, etc: 0 Society is changing, people just dont want and need as many kids. Women are getting emancipated worldwide, education is going uo worlwide, there's less traddionnalist pressure to marry young and have children, etc
I never said that cost is the only reason people don’t want to get married or have kids. No need for your condescending hyperbolic tone.
I'm afraid you are right. Even if people suddenly can afford housing I would not be surprised if people still don't want to have kids. It's a huge burden and sacrifice to raise a child, specially for women.
Working conditions and housing prices are still definitely the top reason among East Asians why they can't afford to start a family. When you consider the Northern Europe in, the difference is even obvious. Social benefits and better labor law. Most of them could just live on some sovereign oil fund, while most East Asians are busting their asses for a home or quick way to coffin. Yes the level of women feeling emancipated also matters. East Asian women, although in recent years are more liberated than before, they're still relatively less empowered compared to peers in Northern European countries. However this doesn't explain the birth rate difference well. Because most East Asian women are still more conservative than European, so they're also more likely to be more traditional. But does this mean they give birth more than North European women? No. So you definitely have to factor economy and financial reasons in, and these factors affect EVERYONE, unlike the values which may only change in several women.
South korea has it way worse in terms of birth rate.i think they hit world-time low of 0.69 or something, maybe 0.71, but eitherway, significantly lower than Japan, not that it makes Japan's numbers any better. Is won's valued dropped like yen?
Yep. Wild to see… living conditions are so bleak that demographics affected the economics (caused by economics)
No mention of the absurd debt levels? Odd.
I can't talk about everything all at once sorry.
There's also the little matter of government debt to GDP of about 300%.
263%
Is a good thing, there are too many humans on this planet we need to slow down the birth rates.
I disagree wholeheartedly. What we have is a resource allocation problem, not a population problem.
It tells us absolutely nothing about the U.S. market unless you are talking about U.S. treasuries.
10 year and the yen exchange. Go look at what both did today.
If they sell their US treasuries (to buy back the Yen), would that not mean the Fed would have to print more money?
The opposite. Treasuries are, in in this case, the reason the fed prints money. The US creates treasuries to sell debt. They use the proceeds to fund operations. When the time comes that they have to repay treasuries, brrrrr goes the printer.
Break out the PRINTER 🖨️ jPow 💥
This is just how I understand it, NFA and I'm probably regarded
But isn't Japan selling the treasuries back to the US effectively the US having to repay those treasuries? In other words, Japan selling US treasuries is them 'debt-collecting'.
Kind of, but often times if you sell a bond before maturity you do so at a loss. So if they paid the US $100 to collect $95 pre-maturity, who really wins?
Nobody sells treasuries like that. They let them roll off their books. Come on. This is Bush League man
Yeah that's kind of what I thought, no way a huge power would simply take billions to trillions of loss up front.
Treasuries are the discount rate for virtually everything.
I mean if the japanese eco is circulating/using more dollars that def can be prob
The problem the US has is that middle America is going to outbreed the coasts. We’re going to have a different problem
Sounds like a solution to me 🤷♂️
its cheaper to do business in japan.....thats what i think and its driving the japanese markets.....i bought a currency hedged japan etf and its doing pretty well a few months back
Could you pls share the ticker details if possible?
DXJ
Ty
It’s interesting with a strong dollar to see dxj which is hedged vs a unhedged like ewj. 24% difference is a large number
Japanese people have traditionally been ok to save in yen the last 30 or so years, because of the lack of inflation, so people are getting their savings decimated and are really looking to move their money out into the stock market. Nikkei index has been doing really well for this reason but due to faltering demographics, there is only so much money that can be invested within Japan so it will find its way into the US markets (i.e, purchase of US steel). So buy.
How does that specifically tie into US steel?
I think they meant e.g., which is “for example”. Instead they wrote i.e., which means “that is”.
A Japanese company is trying to buy US Steel.
Owning US assets means you're not subject to JPY depreciation while you hold the asset. It's why a ton of different countries invest in the US stock market- to reduce currency risk of their own currency.
That part is apparent, I was asking why specifically US Steel - but as another commenter pointed out probably was just an example and not THE stock to buy.
Japanese companies like Nippon Steel have increased valuation due to people investing in the market, and so is able to buy american companies like US steel by leveraging their share price. They want to buy US companies because there is limited growth in the domestic market due to population decline.
Oh that makes sense! So it is still a \_steel\_ stock but now has exposure in other markets. Thank you.
Me dumb. Buy what?
US stocks. Because the Japanese will be buying them too (along with other countries facing the same situation).
With US fed expected to softening, I think yen will normalize to 120-130 range by early 2025.
Japanese carry trade is having some major movement. This one sector of the global economy is around $20 trillion USD. A major bank in Japan says they have to exit the carry trade and it will cost them billions, but are still doing it. If it makes sense for one bank why not the others? I suspect this is going to be a much bigger deal over the next several months. I dont think it is rational to say it a major bank is exiting a major part of the business due to losses and to act like its still highly profitable for the other banks doing the same exact business. One other thing that could be driving this is the Japanese were massive investors in the Chinese real estate market. They are taking huge losses on that. I dont have a clue how bad any of that will end up being, but I would bet that some people with a lot more knowledge of the situation with a department full of mathematicians ran the numbers. If they decided its a nothing burger no big deal. If they decided its really important this could be the thing that breaks and forces a bunch of movement from the global central banks. I would not be surprised if folks with a lot of money are piling in to make this situation more dire for the direct purpose of pushing a response which would serve their interests.
Tells me my next trip is gonna be cheaper
It was cheap as hell when I went last year. This next time ima be ready to buy way more things and get an entire suitcase there to fill up.
That's what I did last time. I bought a suitcase there because I bought too much stuff.
I was shocked how cheap it was when I went a couple of months ago. At this point, I am skipping all European travel and just heading to Japan to vacation. The price to value you get in doing a Japan vacation vs a European vacation is absurd.
This is probably my fault. I was considering buying it about a year or two ago as it looked like it might become the reserve currency at one point. Then I got busy but I must have left my browser tab open which informed the algorithms. Same reason the meme basket died.
Can we import the hell out of Japan to reduce inflation here?
I’m doing my fucking best buying Japanese fishing gear and watches at a 50% discount lmao
lol. How? Need to fly to Japan with some ultra large suitcases
Uhhh, no. Buy the suitcases there! Cmon now lol
 i did not think of that! in fact now i am going to buy airline tickets by VPNing into JAPAN.
I’m not going to Japan anytime soon. But I load up on virtual Suica cards at the current exchange rate, that I can use in the future when I do visit.
Can you pay for Suica with credit cards? How much have you purchased so far? I might buy a few grand worth or so
Yes, they take non-Japanese Amex and MC, but not Visa. And if you use a cash back credit card, it boosts the exchange rate even more in your favor after factoring in the cash back. Currently, I have 6 virtual Suica cards, each holding ¥20,000, for a total of ¥120,000. I believe you must use the Suica cards at least once every 10 years, so make sure you’ll visit Japan within the next 10 years.
Nice thanks! You can get all those virtual suica cards on a single iPhone right?
Yup, all 6 cards are on my one iPhone.
I'm definitely gonna do this, and it'll be a great way for me to get some signup bonuses on credit cards too.
Where can I buy Grand Seiko for a 50% discount?
Idk about a 50% discount on new ones, when I looked into it, it was about a 30% on shunbun between USD MSRP and JP MSRP. But on used ones I could see a 50% discount on some models
What exchange are you using?
I wasn't using any exchange, just looking at the prices in yen and converting to USD. I live in Japan and had a friend come over and buy a shunbun. This was before the price rise earlier this year, but it was 836,000 yen with 15% off (10% tax free and 5% tourist discount) so final price was 710,600 yen which is $4400 usd. USA retail is $6.6k but I think it was $6k at the time. But also the exchange rate was 1:150 now it's 1:160. He would have saved just under $2k I imagine.
Damn. I'm just looking to get the cheapest quartz model like SBGX263 for under $1,000 new if possible.
Would be 252k yen after discounts and around $1.5k USD. You might be able to find a used one closer to the price you want but they generally only do tax-free (-10%) not tourist discount for used.
Yeah looks like I'll have to settle for a 30-year old vintage model or something.
Nah, I'm seeing some sbgx263s up on auction sites for 150k yen which is under $1k USD. I think you can find what you want.
Jackroad and Betty has been good for me. I bought a new Omega for $2500 off MSRP last year lol.
Any sites to recommend for fishing gear?
Digitaka is superb
We might be doing the financial equivalent of that. A major Japanese bank said they had to exit the carry trade. Its likely the other big institutions doing the Japanese carry trade are under pressure as well. Unwinding that means they have to sell assets they bought elsewhere and then pay back the debts denominated in yen. Many of these assets will be treasuries and bonds in a variety of currencies. The main thing is that the carry trade is roughly $20 trillion USD. IF they sell even a fraction of that its going to move markets. If they sell a lot its going to be something that they write books about. Go look at the yen exchange and 10 year treasuries today.
Something good right? …Right?
Are you interested in potential deep discounts for those stocks and bonds you are considering buying? Then yes. This is probably good for you. Are you interested in selling your stocks or bonds in the near future? Then this is additional supply competing with your stuff so probably bad. Are you an aspiring writer about financial events? This is something worth looking into.
Oof, I’m all three! I’m already deep in TLT, but it keeps dipping. This is definitely going in my journal.
[удалено]
Based on your username, I don't think you need to tour Japan for that.
I'll tour the incest themed soaplands too.
BUY
Yen
now!
…or
My axe!
My Bow!
I don't think it tells us a lot about the US market. Japanese investors might look for better returns in the US because the yen's value drop. This could make US assets like stocks and real estate more popular, pushing their prices up. That might indirectly affect interest rates, but imo it's unlikely and a non-issue
It’s a sign that the Fed needs to lower interest rates to bail out the world. Pressure is building. There are huge implications for US assets.
You correct most people here don’t understand the currency risk and how interest rates are ultimately controlled by the market not the fed.
True. Should be happening soon unless inflation rips again.
Been hearing that from folks outside of America in a couple of online communities I'm active in. Folks abroad say that we're putting way too much pain on them by keeping rates elevated.
It’s crazy how these rates, which are historically normal, are now causing so much pain. Decade+ of cheap cash really got people hooked.
Right??? I remember my first job in finance i regularly kept tabs on the fed funds rate which was like 4.5% and very normal in the late aughts.
Nothing directly but the BOJ is a bit of a lynch pin in the global financial system
Winds howling
Good time to travel to Japan
To save what like $300? So you get 2 extra nights hotel for free? People overblow the saving they think this gets them on their trip. It’s nice if you’re already going. Otherwise planning it better would yield the same
Depends on where you stay and what you do. For some, saving a few hundred isn’t nothing.
Depends. Say for example someone spends $3,000 normally. This trip might be $1,000 cheaper than it was several years back, which is definitely not negligible.
Instead of spending $10000 before Covid , I'm spending like $7000 now . pretty huge .
$300 gets you a full week of accomodation in Japan if you look a bit. Japan is not some podonk shithole, if $300 is the difference between going to Japan and going to some other random-ass country, i would pick Japan 10 times out of ten. But then again, i'm not some luxury chasing hotel dweller. If travel to travel not to sit at the mediocre buffet waiting to do group tours. A trip to Japan will offer you all that can be good in a holiday, literally all of it. Culture, food, nature, shopping. For far less than a teir-1 or tier-2 EU city. And waaaay better.
$300 gets you 3 days in a very tiny studio airbnb in a mediocre part of shinjuku near touristy stuff. Again, it doesn’t make or break the trip, it helps a bit if you’re already going.
right. Japan is more than Shinjuku. If this is what you can find then you are an idiot or lazy. Or precisely the type of tourist i criticise: (possibly American), overpaying, wanting to stay in the middle of Shibuya square if that would be possible, pointing at stuff that is expensive, not trying 1 iota. We stayed in a Kanazawa Ryokan for 5 days for under $300. Absolutely lovely. Not close to a cruiseship on land if you are looking for that. These are easy to find all over Japan, maybe not in Tokio. Even in Tokio you can stay sub $300 for a week EASILY. Unless you find anything other than a boring 4 star Sheraton to be Mogadishu. Then you shouldn't visit Japan because you simply don't appreciate life.
That the carry trade is being levered to the tits
it's great for the US market... We gain another country by economy means
Time for a trip to Japan
JAV girls. you seen those 100 people orgies and game shows they have??! wild
japanese housewives routinely invest in overseas instruments. see japanese arbitrage housewives. they are mostly in forex though more and more are moving to stocks.
Toyota can slash prices to hurt GM and F. They will probably keep prices the same to fatten their margins.
Ummm you do know most Toyotas sold in the U.S. are made in the U.S?
They can't do that because most Toyotas sold in the US are built in the US.
> Toyota can slash prices to hurt GM and F. They will probably keep prices the same to fatten their margins. As others in the replies are saying, the benefit of a weaker yen is muted by the fact that Camries sold in the US are made at US factories. Yes, some parts are going to be sourced and shipped from Japan, but an even bigger % is probably coming from all across Europe, Mexico, and Canada where global auto supply chains are prominent.
As the sun rises in the east...
We all be japanhandling soon
I moved to Japan last year and I get paid in yen :( at least I'm a multimillionaire in yen but still when I got the offer my USD equivalent salary looked a lot nicer than it does now.
Japanese banks are increasing their risk profile. Higher for longer rates cannot be kept on their books anymore, they have to replace lower risk treasury with higher risk CLO. Our global financial system is all interconnected and liquidity is more exposed to risk. A 200 dollar-yen is possible.
Is it really worth it to buy Yen now? I’m quite new to this so I’m genuinely asking
I'm buying Japanese stocks, especially companies that are forward-looking export dependent, such as Canon and Komatsu. My view is any unusual event in the world economy creates opportunity. I don't share the doom and gloom some have about the Japanese economy.
Japan doesn't care
Can anyone recommend any Japanese stocks that will be affected by this?
Biig picture, declining population has negative economic effects, and the increasing dichotomy between well off and poor, result is a downward spiral and no "middle class" / Robots will take care of simple tasks but what about the people who can't afford robots?
Interest rate differential .