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The story
A report highlighted the case of a man who quit his job just 19 days after starting and, unable to rely on his parents, ended up on welfare in his 20s. According to an NHK survey, about 46% of welfare recipients in their 20s that fiscal year were single-person households, and the number of single recipients in their 20s has grown to roughly 7 times what it was 25 years ago. The head of a support group pointed out that “one factor is that the parents’ generation is itself struggling financially and can’t support their kids,” and the number of people in their 20s receiving welfare due to disability or illness has also roughly quadrupled over the same 25 years. On 5ch, opinions were divided over workplaces that burn out new hires early, the connection to the “Lost Generation” (hyouga-ki, those who entered the job market during Japan’s long post-bubble recession and struggled to find work), the real-world practice of certifying disabilities, and how the welfare system itself should work.
While elderly households make up about half of all welfare recipients, the sharp rise in single-person recipients in their 20s has been especially striking in recent years, now reaching roughly 7 times the level of 25 years ago. According to an NHK survey, about 46% of recipients in their 20s that fiscal year were single-person households.
Nana Iwamoto, representative director of the NPO POSSE, which supports young people in financial hardship, points out that “the parents’ generation is struggling too, and not being able to rely on them is one factor driving poverty among young singles.” What’s more, people with disabilities or illnesses make up nearly half of welfare households in their 20s — a figure that has also roughly quadrupled over 25 years, suggesting a growing number of young people on welfare who find it hard to work because of disability or illness.
AERA
Source: dot.asahi.com / Original article here
What people said
Maybe it's the labor shortage, but they push so hard to fast-track new hires that a lot of them burn out and quit early.
A guy who started with me quit after just six months over it.
Also, the power harassment and sexual harassment from bubble-generation bosses over 40 is just brutal.
"You don't even know THAT?"
"You're useless."
"I'm only telling you once."
Those guys aren't even human.
They should hurry up and get laid off and go work in some understaffed industry instead.
Even the Lost Generation is 50+ by now.
The bubble generation is basically at retirement already.
The dead center of the Lost Generation is 46-47.
All they've got is pride.
They don't get that being on welfare ("namapo," slang for government welfare) is seen as rock bottom socially.
Because their parents are from the Lost Generation.
What with all this talk lately of retiring at 45.
↓
Get hired as a new grad
↓
Quit within 3 years
↓
Jump to a sweatshop job (a "black company")
↓
Mind and body break down, quit
↓
Fall into non-regular work in your 20s
↓
Family back home is broke, you've got no savings either — straight to welfare
This pattern is popping up like crazy lately.
If your family's supposedly broke, how'd you afford to go to college in Tokyo in the first place lol.
I'd get it if they lived somewhere they could commute from home.
I get quitting your first job because it's a sweatshop, but quitting your first job and then transferring TO a sweatshop? That's just dumb.
Pretty much what we're doing right now.
Probably because, unlike in the past, being "menhera" (emotionally/mentally unstable) now counts as a valid reason you can't work.
Plenty of people in their 40s use mental health issues as an excuse to mooch off their parents and not work too.
Dude's determined to bash the Lost Generation no matter what lol.
What they need is job placement support.
Who's going to hire someone who might have a mental disability?
You're contradicting Re: #44.
There's a bus driver shortage too — the city should just hire them for that.
That's exactly my point — don't make them job-hunt in the private sector, just hire them as civil servants, no conditions attached.
City bus drivers ARE civil servants, genius.
If you're able to work, working is obviously the easier road.
If that's all it takes to get out of working, that's paradise.
Work and you get power harassment, sexual harassment, moral harassment, customer harassment, harassment-harassment… paragliding! (a sound-pun: stringing together Japanese harassment terms ending in "-hara" until the repeated sound slides into "paragliding")
Don't do that with other people's money.
Live however you want on money you actually earned — no problem there.
"Things you love" isn't really on the table — welfare only gives you enough to eat and sleep.
Does it have something to do with generations before the "satori generation" (Japan's so-called "enlightened" or low-desire cohort that came of age in the 2010s) generally having stay-at-home moms?
If that's not it, then what's the difference… is it just that the social mood these days is darker?
I honestly don't get why this trend suddenly shows up with the generational shift like this.
How they were raised, and what they ate.
Because "poverty business" scams (operators who profit off exploiting the poor) are running rampant.
Productivity is already sky-high, so we also need people on the consumption side to keep things circulating.
So this is fine as is.
We're in an era where basic income is being seriously debated anyway.
Welfare will probably get abolished eventually.
By then I'll be dead anyway, so who cares lol.
Background and Key Points of This Debate
Welfare statistics are compiled by the age of the household head, based on surveys such as the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare’s survey of welfare recipients. The rise in single-person households in their 20s appears to stem from a mix of factors, including the spread of non-regular employment and increased diagnosis and social recognition of mental illness and developmental disabilities. The thread split between those who see the parents’ generation’s (the Lost Generation’s) lack of financial means as the main driver, and those who suspect personal laziness or abuse of the system. Worth noting, even though the article itself doesn’t mention it: welfare payments are capped at bare subsistence level and come with regular check-ins from a caseworker, so the notion that recipients get to “live easy” doesn’t really match reality.
※This article is compiled as excerpts and a summary from the 5ch (News Express+) thread “Man who quit 19 days after joining a company ends up on welfare in his 20s, unable to rely on his parents either… single recipients in their 20s now roughly 7 times what they were 25 years ago“.
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