As a tourist Japan is like 2003 Mexico as a Canadian – purchasing power is high, it’s a wonderful place to visit… but if you’re making the salaries I see online and posted for recruitment posters then people are getting throttled by Cost of living in some cities… maybe all?
Japan seems to employ more people for lower wage as a strategy or social norm – I see 4 people directing traffic into one parking garage and wonder how this could be affordable to businesses,
Paywall
The “Big Mac index” is a well known chart. Globally it helps see how much ppl are really making.
Fairly misleading, especially when comparing to two of the most expensive countries in the world where the cost of living is dramatically larger than Japan (double or even triple in some cases).
Sure, you can buy 2.56 Big Macs in Hong Kong with an hourly wage but the majority of your income is automatically deleted by your rent, same goes for most younger people in Australia who are renting.
I’ve moved from Sydney, Australia to Osaka and even if my salary is lower I absolutely feel richer and save more in the long run.
Charts from the paywalled article:
**Number of Big Macs a worker can buy for one-hour work**
Need to stop JP companies asking what your previous salary was and having them suck teeth and offer 5% on top of that.
I fucking hate big maconomics.
Japan’s economy has stagnated for so long, we all know that, and now is when the real push and pull occurs because of things like inflation. Whether companies decide to change their ways is up to them, but society will bear the brunt of bad decisions.
I doubt in Japan a big mac is that relevant. None of the ingredients are a key part of their diet for cpi purposes. And there are affordable meal alternatives available.
J gov only cares about the companies not regular workers, wages are discusting here I won’t be a slave for what ¥800 p/ hour less in the countryside.
Now look at housing instead of Big Macs.
Better yet – compare the price of a typical bowl of ramen in Tokyo vs London or New York.
Screw Big Macs. Use the Daikon Index and this place is a workers paradise.
They have affordable, delicious food. Perhaps the Big Mac is just overpriced slop compared to a typical Japanese meal.
I’m not sure of the premise of whatever is behind this bullshit paywall, but as a JPN lifer who relatively-recently had his career made redundant by fucking AI and generally can only afford to have food to eat 3 weeks a month, starving through the rest…
FUCK I MISS THE 100 YEN MENU! I mean it was shit food, but so relatively affordable… I’m so hungry…
13 comments
They’re not wrong.
As a tourist Japan is like 2003 Mexico as a Canadian – purchasing power is high, it’s a wonderful place to visit… but if you’re making the salaries I see online and posted for recruitment posters then people are getting throttled by Cost of living in some cities… maybe all?
Japan seems to employ more people for lower wage as a strategy or social norm – I see 4 people directing traffic into one parking garage and wonder how this could be affordable to businesses,
Paywall
The “Big Mac index” is a well known chart. Globally it helps see how much ppl are really making.
Fairly misleading, especially when comparing to two of the most expensive countries in the world where the cost of living is dramatically larger than Japan (double or even triple in some cases).
Sure, you can buy 2.56 Big Macs in Hong Kong with an hourly wage but the majority of your income is automatically deleted by your rent, same goes for most younger people in Australia who are renting.
I’ve moved from Sydney, Australia to Osaka and even if my salary is lower I absolutely feel richer and save more in the long run.
Charts from the paywalled article:
**Number of Big Macs a worker can buy for one-hour work**
|Country|2019|2024|
|:-|:-|:-|
|Australia|4|4|
|U.K.|2.5|3|
|Hong Kong|2|2.5|
|U.S.|2.5|2.8|
|Japan|2|2.5|
|Singapore|2|1.8|
|South Korea|1.8|1.8|
**Hourly wage in dollars**
|Country|2019|2024|
|:-|:-|:-|
|Australia|17|20|
|U.K.|13|15|
|U.S.|12|14|
|Canada|10|13|
|Singapore|8|11|
|Hong Kong|6|7|
|South Korea|5|7|
|Japan|8|6|
Need to stop JP companies asking what your previous salary was and having them suck teeth and offer 5% on top of that.
I fucking hate big maconomics.
Japan’s economy has stagnated for so long, we all know that, and now is when the real push and pull occurs because of things like inflation. Whether companies decide to change their ways is up to them, but society will bear the brunt of bad decisions.
I doubt in Japan a big mac is that relevant. None of the ingredients are a key part of their diet for cpi purposes. And there are affordable meal alternatives available.
J gov only cares about the companies not regular workers, wages are discusting here I won’t be a slave for what ¥800 p/ hour less in the countryside.
Now look at housing instead of Big Macs.
Better yet – compare the price of a typical bowl of ramen in Tokyo vs London or New York.
Screw Big Macs. Use the Daikon Index and this place is a workers paradise.
They have affordable, delicious food. Perhaps the Big Mac is just overpriced slop compared to a typical Japanese meal.
I’m not sure of the premise of whatever is behind this bullshit paywall, but as a JPN lifer who relatively-recently had his career made redundant by fucking AI and generally can only afford to have food to eat 3 weeks a month, starving through the rest…
FUCK I MISS THE 100 YEN MENU! I mean it was shit food, but so relatively affordable… I’m so hungry…