＜prologue＞
I started a blog called “The Baby Boomer Generation’s Miscellaneous Blog”（Dankai-sedai no garakutatyou:団塊世代の我楽多（がらくた）帳） in July 2018, about a year before I fully retired. More than six years have passed since then, and the number of articles has increased considerably.
So, in order to make them accessible to people who don’t understand Japanese, I decided to translate my past articles into English and publish them.
It may sound a bit exaggerated, but I would like to make this my life’s work.
It should be noted that haiku and waka （Japanese short fixed form poems） are quite difficult to translate into English, so some parts are written in Japanese.
If you are interested in haiku or waka and would like to know more, please read introductory or specialized books on haiku or waka written in English.
I also write many articles about the Japanese language. I would be happy if these inspire more people to want to learn Japanese.
my blog’s URL:団塊世代の我楽多（がらくた）帳 | 団塊世代が雑学や面白い話を発信しています
my X’s URL:団塊世代の我楽多帳（@historia49) on X
<Added October 6, 2021> Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Aso also expressed concern over “Japan’s socialist tendencies” in his farewell address.
In his farewell address on October 5, Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Aso expressed concern over the current fiscal situation, saying, “We’ve been evacuating, and now we’re in an abnormal situation where 30% of the national budget is spent on welfare,” expressing concern over the continuing increase in social security costs due to the declining birthrate and aging population.
Recently, measures have been implemented for businesses facing bankruptcy or closure, or experiencing financial difficulties due to the COVID-19 pandemic, including interest-free and unsecured loans, business sustainability subsidies, rent support subsidies, special employment adjustment subsidies, business closure cooperation subsidies, work style reform promotion support subsidies, and property tax reductions.
Support is also being provided to employees of companies through such measures as business closure support subsidies and grants, housing security subsidies, temporary special subsidies for single-parent households, temporary special subsidies for households with children, emergency small-scale interest-free loans, and tax deferrals.
It is also a problem that many students who are unable to work part-time due to the effects of COVID-19 are considering taking a leave of absence or dropping out, and support such as the “Emergency Student Support Grant” is being implemented.
However, when I stop and think about it carefully, I cannot help but wonder, “Aren’t these recent policies and trends in Japan becoming too socialist?”
1. Aren’t we wasting taxpayers’ money like throwing it down the drain?
It’s pointless to inject money into companies whose bankruptcy is inevitable. There have been examples of such large-scale small business support loans in the past.
Such emergency support loans also run the risk of increasing financial institutions’ non-performing loans.
For individuals, there is a safety net called “welfare.” I’ve heard of a paradoxical “reversal phenomenon” in which “welfare households,” which receive various preferential treatment such as free medical care, live better lives than working households that do not receive welfare.
Even though many students are considering taking a leave of absence or dropping out, the current university enrollment rate is far too high. It is a rational decision for a certain percentage of students to drop out of university due to tight household finances or reduced income from part-time work, and I question whether it is necessary to use taxpayers’ money to keep them from leaving.
Japan is wasting a huge amount of tax money on “support for developing countries,” “measures against global warming,” and “measures against plastic waste,” but I think we need to stop and think about this now.
2. Are the financial resources sufficient?
Have the Japanese government and Ministry of Finance converted to MMT theory? It seems like they’ve been overly generous in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic. Is it a case of “let it be what it may”?
If tax money continues to be spent like this, I don’t think Japan’s fiscal reconstruction will be viable.
3. Has Japan become a socialist country?
I once heard a story about a Chinese student studying in Japan who commented, “Japan is an ideal socialist country.” According to this student, “In China, the gap between rich and poor between rural areas and big cities like Shanghai and Beijing is so large that it cannot be compared to Japan. In Japan, it’s hard to tell who is rich and who is poor. This is the kind of country China wanted to create.”
That’s why so many Chinese people were surprised when Suga Yoshihide, a man of “peasant origin,” became prime minister in September 2020.