Never having visited, this may be a bit broad of a question, but does a welfare system exist to aid the poor / disadvanted in Japan? Is poverty even a significant problem there? How about the caste system (referencing the Buraku), is it still in place? If so, how does it play a factor in the government’s approach to the issue? Any info on the matter would be appreciated.
It says that 1% benefits from social welfare.
In Tokyo you will see bums and crazies in some of the parks – not many, but some. I’d imagine it’s the same in other large cities.
If you want to read a bit about the burakumin/eta phenomenon (burakumin people seem to be disproportionately among the small lower class in Japan):
In Tokyo, there are also a lot of tent villages along the rivers, particularly the Sumida. From what I’ve read, most of the people living there are day laborers, doing occasional unskilled work mainly on construction sites. One thing you won’t find, though, are panhandlers. In all the years I’ve been here (and making no effort to avoid the homeless), I’ve never once been asked for money or seen anyone on the street or in the subways begging. Whether that’s due to a good safety net, strict policing, cultural pride or some combination of the three, I don’t know.
As for people who are simply poor, as opposed to homeless, then yes, there is a pretty extensive social welfare system available to everyone. Education is free and the public schools are of uniformly decent quality (there’s less of the urban/suburban gap that there is in the US. Public schools in poorer neighborhoods aren’t too far behind those in more affluent ones). Low-cost public universities are also available. There is universal health insurance, with premiums based on annual income (the quality is debatable: my private insurance is cheaper and covers more). There’s also a national pension system, but how long that will last as demographics change (I can’t cite this, but I recall hearing that 30 years ago or so, there were 16 working-age citizens for every retiree. 20 years from now, there will be only 2), nobody knows.
One thing that makes a big difference in quality of life for the poor here is the crime rate. There are no parts of Tokyo with rampant street crime, and not really anywhere that I would advise people to stay away from, even at night (I wouldn’t want my wife to go jogging or cycling along the rivers after midnight, but I do so fairly regularly and have never had a problem). Although their actual effectiveness is debateable, the police box system (small one- or two-room mini-stations every few blocks) makes the police pretty visible and readily accessible just about everywhere.
I should add that for a long time, Japan has maintained a self-image of a ‘middle-class nation’ with no upper or lower class, and one of the recent criticisms of Prime Minister Koizumi is that his policies to increase privatization have started to change that (Revival in Japan brings widening of economic gap).
I was married in Japan about a year ago so I got to see first hand how the homeless situation looks in Tokyo. Compared to Philadelphia, New York, and some other large cities I’ve seen here there are far fewer homeless people in Tokyo. I traveled on the train and subway extensively for 2 weeks and saw maybe a dozen homeless people total.
Poverty-san.