Editor’s note: Students have been reading Anne Allison‘s Precarious Japan and are commenting how recent economic and social challenges in Japan are impacting their plans for their futures.

Anonymous student post

As Anne Allison described in her book Precarious Japan (2013), contemporary Japan is unstable and filled with anxiety. I have felt the precariousness of Japan and I have been struggling to decide a certain future plan to survive in the precarious social condition since I was a high school student. Though I have not reached any concrete future plan yet, I have found the way to help myself. It is having many qualification and much specialized knowledge.

Today’s labor system in Japan is changing rapidly. After the collapse of economic bubble, the employment situation is becoming more flexible and more unstable. According to Allison (2013), one-third of labor forces were registered as irregular workers in 2012. Besides, the former protection for workers of “Japan inc.” such as a permanent employment system and a seniority-based wage system almost broke down and a new strict evaluating system started to be introduced in many companies (Allison, 2013). Considering this situation, Japanese companies may come to require people who can be immediately effective like the company in the western countries, and all workers will be exposed to a harder competition in the near future. In my opinion, to survive in this hard competition and to get close to stability, I must have expert knowledge or be qualified as a specialist. Certain techniques are also helps for improving career.

So I want to have some qualification or learn specialized knowledge in the near future and get a specialist job. Now I am interested in some kind of qualification. However, these are much different from what I am majoring in. Moreover, I do not have enough time to study for the qualifying examination now. When I really try to obtain the qualification, I may study in two schools or enter a professional school after graduating from Ritsumeikan university. However, it costs much money and time. So it increases the burden of my family because I cannot spend so much time to earn money now. Therefore I still hesitate to take action and keep this idea to myself.

In the contemporary precarious society, there are few absolute things. For example, it is thought that public employees is stable. However, because of aging society, tax revenue will decrease more and it may influence the stability of public employees. Therefore I think it is better to having means to earn money as much as possible.