Add Japan to the list of countries that have recently tightened immigration policy

[alp227]

New York Times: "Its Workers Aging, Japan Turns Away Immigrants"

KASHIWA, Japan — Maria Fransiska, a young, hard-working nurse from Indonesia, is just the kind of worker Japan would seem to need to replenish its aging work force.

But Ms. Fransiska, 26, is having to fight to stay. To extend her three-year stint at a hospital outside Tokyo, she must pass a standardized nursing exam administered in Japanese, a test so difficult that only 3 of the 600 nurses brought here from Indonesia and the Philippines since 2007 have passed.

So Ms. Fransiska spends eight hours in Japanese language drills, on top of her day job at the hospital. Her dictionary is dog-eared from countless queries, but she is determined: her starting salary of $2,400 a month was 10 times what she could earn back home, and if she fails, she will never be allowed to return to Japan on the same program again.

Despite facing an imminent labor shortage as its population ages, Japan has done little to open itself up to immigration. In fact, as Ms. Fransiska and many others have discovered, the government is doing the opposite, actively encouraging both foreign workers and foreign graduates of its universities and professional schools to return home while protecting tiny interest groups — in the case of Ms. Fransiska, a local nursing association afraid that an influx of foreign nurses would lower industry salaries.

In 2009, the number of registered foreigners here fell for the first time since the government started to track annual records almost a half-century ago, shrinking 1.4 percent from a year earlier to 2.19 million people — or just 1.71 percent of Japan’s overall population of 127.5 million.

Experts say increased immigration provides one obvious remedy to Japan’s two decades of lethargic economic growth. Instead of accepting young workers, however — and along with them, fresh ideas — Tokyo seems to have resigned itself to a demographic crisis that threatens to stunt the country’s economic growth, hamper efforts to deal with its chronic budget deficits and bankrupt its social security system.

“If you’re in the medical field, it’s obvious that Japan needs workers from overseas to survive. But there’s still resistance,” said Yukiyoshi Shintani, chairman of Aoikai Group, the medical services company that is sponsoring Ms. Fransiska and three other nurses to work at a hospital outside Tokyo. “The exam,” he said, “is to make sure the foreigners will fail.”

In 2008, only 11,000 of the 130,000 foreign students at Japan’s universities and technical colleges found jobs here, according to the recruitment firm, Mainichi Communications. While some Japanese companies have publicly said they will hire more foreigners in a bid to globalize their work forces, they remain a minority.

The barriers to more immigration to Japan are many. Restrictive immigration laws bar the country’s struggling farms or workshops from access to foreign labor, driving some to abuse trainee programs for workers from developing countries, or hire illegal immigrants. Stringent qualification requirements shut out skilled foreign professionals, while a web of complex rules and procedures discourages entrepreneurs from setting up in Japan.

Given the dim job prospects, universities here have been less than successful at raising foreign student enrollment numbers. And in the current harsh economic climate, as local incomes fall and new college graduates struggle to land jobs, there has been scant political will to broach what has been a delicate topic.

But Japan’s demographic time clock is ticking: its population will fall by almost a third to 90 million within 50 years, according to government forecasts. By 2055, more than one in three Japanese will be over 65, as the working-age population falls by over a third to 52 million.

Still, when a heavyweight of the defeated Liberal Democratic Party unveiled a plan in 2008 calling for Japan to accept at least 10 million immigrants, opinion polls showed that a majority of Japanese were opposed. A survey of roughly 2,400 voters earlier this year by the daily Asahi Shimbun showed that 65 percent of respondents opposed a more open immigration policy.

This year during the economic recession other countries this year have been putting up an iron fist on immigration:
- Sweden: The anti-immigrant Sweden Democratic Party http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/20/world/europe/20sweden.html">won 20 seats in a parliament of 349.
- The Netherlands: The Party for Freedom, led by anti-Islam activist Geert Wilders, has backed plans to cut immigration and withdraw from the EU and has 24 out of 150 Dutch House seats.
- UK: An immigration cap that intended to cut the amount of skilled migrant workers was thrown out in court for not going through Parliament.
- US: Locally, there was Arizona's now-watered-down SB 1070 and Congressional Republicans demanding removal of "birthright citizenship" from the 14th Amendment.

[Edweird]

1. Those racist fascist xenophobes! Looking out for their workers! HOW DARE THEY!

The nerve of them trying to maintain a standard of living for their citizens - just like EVERY OTHER COUNTRY.

[Ikonoklast]

2. Except their problem is the exact opposite.

Without bringing in foreign workers, the Japanese standard of living will decline.

They are not replacing needed workers at anywhere near an acceptable rate, and yet their xenophobia will not let them do what is necessary.

And yes, the Japanese are one of the most xenophobic countries on this planet.

Keep out needed workers even when it is detrimental to their aging demographic...real smart move.

[Hannah Bell]

3. hardly. not with over 3% productivity gains yearly.

it takes half the workers to produce an equivalent portion of goods & services as it did just 30 years ago.

1/3 of japanese workers = part-time/temp.

lack of workers isn't their problem -- or ours.

[Mojorabbit]

4. I don't kinow

They will acheive population reduction and preserve their resources. Bringing in foreign nurses will bring the salaries down.