The Dark Secret Behind Japan's 0% Homelessness Rate

in the many ways that Japan stands out there is one particular statistic that completely sets it apart from any other country in the world despite being one of the most populous nations it is the only country in the world that has a homeless population rate of almost zero percent while the United States is experiencing a major homelessness crisis with the number of people living on the street Rising every year Japan seems to have found the solution to a societal issue that was thought to not really have one but if you look past the headlines the situation starts to look very different the reality behind this seemingly amazing success reveals a disturbing and dark reality about what life in Japanese Society is like and what is really going on under the surface so how did Japan manage to have zero percent homelessness rate and why is it actually not good news for the country this is The Dark Secret of how Japan solved homelessness according to official statistics Japan a country with over 125 million residents has around 3 000 homeless people about 0.003 of its population which is way less than other countries with low homelessness rates like Switzerland and Miles Ahead of countries like the us but why exactly well there are several reasons that are often mentioned as the cause of this extremely low rate so first being homeless is actually very difficult in Japan and in the Japanese culture it is incredibly stigmatized according to a founder of a non-profit organization that's supporting the homeless in Japan there is no culture of compassion for homeless people in the country and there are usually seen as people who only have themselves to blame for their situation and who deserve no help at all this is even stronger because the majority of homeless in Japan are men who are traditionally expected to be self-reliant and their failure to do that is seen as an embarrassed assessment both by the public and by themselves as a result the authorities tend to make it harder to actually be homeless than in most countries any kind of begging in the public is banned by law homeless people tend to be pushed out of sight and cities like Tokyo are known for implementing what's been called anti-homeless or hostile architecture like parks that are locked at night so that people can sleep there or benches and other City features that are specifically designed to make lying sleeping and prolonged sitting on them uncomfortable in order to discourage homeless people from staying in the area and so making it both difficult and socially unacceptable to be homeless contributes to the low rate as it is something most people try to avoid at all costs what also helps are some of Japan's unique policies that while not designed to reduce homelessness helped to do it anyway Japan has very very strict loss on basically any drugs other than alcohol and very severe punishment and as a result only 1.6 of the Japanese population tried drugs other than alcohol in their lifetime compared to 46 of Americans which means that drug addiction in Japan is barely an issue and according to Tom Gill a japan-based social Anthropologist this is another key factor at the same time Japan has a very robust Health Care system which is also significant since 30 to 35 percent of people who experience homelessness in the United States have a mental illness and while in Japan people with severe mental illnesses tend to be placed in mental health institutions in the United States they often end up on the street and finally Japan has relatively accessible housing because it builds more houses than any other developed Democratic country unlike most Western countries we're building housing became increasingly difficult due to various regulations Japan took the opposite route and it has very few restrictions making it very easy to build anything and May making it relatively affordable so that all sounds great and on the surface Japan can be an example of a country that basically managed to solve a major social issue except that's not really true despite the official numbers their reality is a lot more grim and there are many many more people without a home in Japan but they are hidden away from sight and government statistics so how is that possible as you might have seen in another one of my videos in the 1990s Japan experienced a severe economic crisis when the stock and real estate markets collapsed in the following years it became extremely difficult to secure a steady regular job with a decent pay and so millions of people were left to survive on low-paying temporary part-time jobs many of them never managed to recover and they became known as Japan's Lost Generation people with no status no place in the society and no future as a consequence many of them were not unable to hold down an apartment and pay rent every month even in a relatively affordable Japan but at the same time they would do anything to avoid living on the streets in order to avoid the shame and stigma from the society that comes with it and so the phenomenon of cyber homeless emerged basically Japan has a wide network of 24-hour internet and manga cafes where people pay by the hour and can stay as long as they want and since the 1990s many of members of Japan's Lost Generation have begun using them as temporary shelters they don't have beds but people often sleep in the computer cubicles and over time the cafes expanded their services to offer food drinks fresh underwear or showers gradually this became an industry of itself and today the Cyber cafes are basically a uniquely Japanese concept of commercial homeless shelters ones that you have to pay for yourself which is by the way not even that cheap prices for an overnight stay in a small Booth cost somewhere between 17 to 28 dollars the net cafe refugees as they are known in Japan often have some kind of a low-paying part-time or temporary job that doesn't pay enough to rent an apartment but they can't afford to pay for a few hours in an internet cafe every night these net cafe refugees are homeless they don't have a home or a permanent address and they're excluded from many aspects of life but they don't look like it they don't sleep outside they work and they do everything they can to maintain a clean shaven polite well-kept appearance to avoid the shame that comes with being homeless in Japan that's why the government statistics of homeless people in Japan are considered wildly underestimated non-government organizations estimate that the real numbers of people living on the streets in Japan is at least three times higher than the government says and that's even without taking in account the Cyber homeless people staying in internet cafes on most nights for at least few hours if they would be included the real number would be radically different since in 2020 it was estimated that at least 15 000 people lived in cyber cafes in Tokyo alone five times as many as the official number of homeless people in the entire Japan now in one way this phenomenon of cyber homelessness can be seen as positive on one hand it helps people to avoid falling on the very bottom of the society and it allows them to keep some level of dignity even though they don't have a home but at the same time the existence of the net cafe refugees demonstrates the incredible problems that the Japanese Society has a whole third of the entire Japanese Workforce over 22 million people are part-time or temp workers not by choice but because they can't get a regular full-time job not all of them are homeless but most of them are only paid a minimum wage age they struggle to afford a normal Rend and they have no prospects of their economic situation ever getting much better and so even though Japan's official homelessness rate is much lower than in the U.S the percentage of people living in poverty is actually higher in Japan than in the states and while only a few end up on the street many more end up on The Fringe of the society stuck living in cyber cafes and capsule hotels and in a never-ending cycle of not being able to get a proper job to get an apartment and not being able to get an apartment to get a proper job because of societal pressure they prefer to remain invisible and Society prefers it as well a problem that stays out of sight is a problem that can be easily ignored and the government can continue to claim a zero percent homelessness rate but underneath it is a symbol of all the things that went wrong with the Japanese economy and a problem that's here to stay as the number of the invisible homeless is only about to grow

Channel: Explained with Dom

Views: 4,504,413

Keywords: japan homeless, cyber homeless japan, net cafe refugees, lost generation japan, lost decade japan, economic crisis japan, economic downfall japan

Id: IXZ-DQABUKU

Length: 8min 57sec (537 seconds)

Published: Mon Mar 13 2023