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rxk22
Joined: 19 May 2010
Posts: 1629
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jtea
Joined: 22 Apr 2014
Posts: 69
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 Posted: Sun May 25, 2014 7:32 pm Post subject: |
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| It's unfortunate that a country which is pretty family oriented put so much stress on "working". You'd think that they would just put more emphasis on going home to spend more time with family than creating another national holiday which people may or may not take off. It's been proven that staying at work more often and not taking time off doesn't exactly make Japan all that much more productive :/ |
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rxk22
Joined: 19 May 2010
Posts: 1629
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| Posted: Sun May 25, 2014 10:37 pm Post subject: |
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| jtea wrote: |
| It's unfortunate that a country which is pretty family oriented put so much stress on "working". You'd think that they would just put more emphasis on going home to spend more time with family than creating another national holiday which people may or may not take off. It's been proven that staying at work more often and not taking time off doesn't exactly make Japan all that much more productive :/ |
My theory is that when the work mores were created/solidified, that it was the 50's. Japan was still recovering. So if you stayed at work a bit longer, you could help crank out a new toy/product, which helped you/the company/and Japan.
Now, that most jobs require thinking, and aren't jobs that are in production,
Japanese productivity per hour is awful.
http://stats.oecd.org/Index.aspx?DatasetCode=LEVEL
I've seen it at all my jobs. As an ALT, I saw my co teachers stay at school everyday for at least 10 hours. Sometimes they'd be there for 12. WHich all it did was make them uncreative and flat as teachers.
I would go to some of the other teachers classes to practice my listening comprehension. Japanese classes are horribly boring. I feel that only some of that is the fault of training.
I really wish that Japan would get away from the whole idea that leaving work on time is a terrible thing to do. As all of society suffers from this. I bet they could get a decent birthrate boost if they kicked out the salary men at 5:30
Also, since I get August off, this doesn't help me in any way  |
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timothypfox
Joined: 20 Feb 2008
Posts: 492
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| Posted: Mon May 26, 2014 12:18 am Post subject: |
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| Companies and employees will invariably still find a way to work on this mandated "day off." |
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Pitarou
Joined: 16 Nov 2009
Posts: 1116
Location: Narita, Japan
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| Posted: Mon May 26, 2014 3:18 am Post subject: |
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I'm glad there's someone on this forum who goes out of their way to get the facts and figures, rather than making sweeping conclusions based on their own narrow experience. 
| Quote: |
| My theory is that when the work mores were created/solidified, that it was the 50's. Japan was still recovering. So if you stayed at work a bit longer, you could help crank out a new toy/product, which helped you/the company/and Japan. |
It might interest you to read up on the history of the 40-hour work. There seems to be a rough consensus that, if you push people much past 40-hours, fatigue hits productivity hard, even in mindless manufacturing jobs. When Henry T. Ford switched his factories from a 54 hour work week to a 40 hour work week, he saw little decline in output.
In any case, I think it's a mistake to focus on Japan's post-war economic miracle. Japan laid strong economic foundations before the war. Sure, all the factories were blown to smithereens but, for reasons I won't go into just now, it's much easier to rebuild (and maybe even rebuild better) after everything has been destroyed than to start from scratch. Much of Japan's post-war miracle was really a high-speed recapitulation of Japan's pre-war miracle.
Which is a long-winded way of saying, if you want to find the roots of Japan's long-hours culture, I think you'll have to look back a lot further than the '50s. Personally, I see is as an extension of the culture of "you must be seen to be putting in your best effort", or ganbare. I see this, for instance, in the perfectionism-over-pragmatism attitude to snow clearance after a rare heavy snow fall around Tokyo, or the earnestness of every tedious little ceremony. That, along with a business culture that marries American corporatism with Japanese feudalism, is a recipe for heroic burnout. |
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mitsui
Joined: 10 Jun 2007
Posts: 1562
Location: Kawasaki
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| Posted: Mon May 26, 2014 4:57 am Post subject: |
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I flew to LA from Narita about a month ago and sat next to a woman who told me about her job.
She works five days a week, goes to work in the morning but stays at work until midnight, at least five days a week.
She works in tourism. I thought that work is just like being in a bad family that you just cannot break free of.
I think younger workers from other parts of Japan might put up with this, since they may think that that is just the Tokyo way.
She is from Tottori.
If you go back in history you could learn that small businesses that operated out of people`s homes would just stay open at least 6 days a week. There was no TV, radio etc. Work was just everything.
My brother-in-law in Osaka works everyday. He makes udon and soba.
It is just masochism. |
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Pitarou
Joined: 16 Nov 2009
Posts: 1116
Location: Narita, Japan
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| Posted: Mon May 26, 2014 5:38 am Post subject: |
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| mitsui wrote: |
| If you go back in history you could learn that small businesses that operated out of people`s homes would just stay open at least 6 days a week.... |
Don't you think that a family running a business from its home is a very different matter from giving one's every waking hour over to "the man"? |
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jtea
Joined: 22 Apr 2014
Posts: 69
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| Posted: Mon May 26, 2014 6:07 am Post subject: |
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| Pitarou wrote: |
| mitsui wrote: |
| If you go back in history you could learn that small businesses that operated out of people`s homes would just stay open at least 6 days a week.... |
Don't you think that a family running a business from its home is a very different matter from giving one's every waking hour over to "the man"? |
This is true but I think the root problem that mitsui was going for goes back to a nation's "need" to work for hours on end. |
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rxk22
Joined: 19 May 2010
Posts: 1629
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rxk22
Joined: 19 May 2010
Posts: 1629
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| Posted: Mon May 26, 2014 10:38 pm Post subject: |
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| Pitarou wrote: |
I'm glad there's someone on this forum who goes out of their way to get the facts and figures, rather than making sweeping conclusions based on their own narrow experience.
| Quote: |
| My theory is that when the work mores were created/solidified, that it was the 50's. Japan was still recovering. So if you stayed at work a bit longer, you could help crank out a new toy/product, which helped you/the company/and Japan. |
It might interest you to read up on the history of the 40-hour work. There seems to be a rough consensus that, if you push people much past 40-hours, fatigue hits productivity hard, even in mindless manufacturing jobs. When Henry T. Ford switched his factories from a 54 hour work week to a 40 hour work week, he saw little decline in output.
In any case, I think it's a mistake to focus on Japan's post-war economic miracle. Japan laid strong economic foundations before the war. Sure, all the factories were blown to smithereens but, for reasons I won't go into just now, it's much easier to rebuild (and maybe even rebuild better) after everything has been destroyed than to start from scratch. Much of Japan's post-war miracle was really a high-speed recapitulation of Japan's pre-war miracle.
Which is a long-winded way of saying, if you want to find the roots of Japan's long-hours culture, I think you'll have to look back a lot further than the '50s. Personally, I see is as an extension of the culture of "you must be seen to be putting in your best effort", or ganbare. I see this, for instance, in the perfectionism-over-pragmatism attitude to snow clearance after a rare heavy snow fall around Tokyo, or the earnestness of every tedious little ceremony. That, along with a business culture that marries American corporatism with Japanese feudalism, is a recipe for heroic burnout. |
Thanks. I try 
As for working time, I wonder how much was from pre WWII. As a lot of the deals and what not were actually made in the late 60s, when there was a ton of worker and student unrest.
But Japan, and maybe Germany, are the only countries where the work ethic has become part of culture. I mean as deep as it has become here, compared to countries like Mexico where they work a lot, but being lazy is seen as OK.
The late 1800,s and early 1900,s had some interesting work related experiments. They messed with the lighting, but discovered that paying attention to the workers is what made them more productive.
Ford, and P&G actually cared about their workers, which I also feel why they arrived at a much shorter work week. But still, over 40 per week, and you start having some diminishing returns. I am sure at 60+ here in Japan, that you have some massive decreases in productivity. |
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Pitarou
Joined: 16 Nov 2009
Posts: 1116
Location: Narita, Japan
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| Posted: Mon May 26, 2014 11:15 pm Post subject: |
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| rxk22 wrote: |
| The late 1800,s and early 1900,s had some interesting work related experiments. They messed with the lighting, but discovered that paying attention to the workers is what made them more productive. |
I'm glad you mentioned that.
You're referring to the (in)famous Hawthorne Studies. The validity of the interpretation is heavily questioned because, among other reasons:
* The researchers, who included Elton "Human Relations" Mayo, claimed to be "shocked" by the results but, in truth, these results conformed exactly to Mayo's theories.
* In their publication, they forgot to mention important facts like "when we sacked a lazy worker and replaced her with a more motivated one, productivity increased".
| Quote: |
| But Japan, and maybe Germany, are the only countries where the work ethic has become part of culture. |
Tthere's a big difference with German culture. The Japanese focus on effort; the Germans focus on efficiency. So overtime is frowned on, because it leads to inefficiency. In Germany, "overtime" is synonymous with "somebody screwed up".
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| Ford, and P&G actually cared about their workers, which I also feel why they arrived at a much shorter work week. |
You're right, of course, but ... are you suggesting that Japanese firms don't care about their workers? What happened to the sacred lifetime bond between employer and employee?  |
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rxk22
Joined: 19 May 2010
Posts: 1629
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| Posted: Wed May 28, 2014 10:52 am Post subject: |
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| I am going to PM you. We will nerd this place up too much. BTW I am in Chiba as well. |
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