DDK comments

people consider heavily exchange rates when traveling. Friends in the U.S. now are reconsidering their trip. It has become less affordable and with unreadably small hotel rooms at very expensive prices the lower yen amount surely will have its touch. The artificial rate, because of the governments intervention, will overall hurt the Japanese economy as the overfill factors that Japan in the long run can’t compete with China and influx of cheap poor labor, standards are lowering meaning quality is already suffering. The robotic substandard service will only continue the Japan slip in overall gdp

Japan is not an amusement park for US citizens. Some of us work hard trying to build their future here.

The artificial exchange rate was the previous one, not this. The differential in the interest rate between the two countries is what drove up the exchange rate. Now that America must cut the interest rate to save the economy, the exchange rate will favor the yen by a lot (at last)

As far as I’m concerned, they can all go bankrupt. Bad service and crazy rules always discounted as being “Japanese culture”. Not to mention the crazy price hike we have seen in these past few months.

This murder has been handled in a terrible way really.

Those who are interested in knowing more about it can watch the excellent information video put together by KyotoRobato (one of the few foreign content creators I like on YT)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1_E-ev-mqpA

Spent a few days in Cairns for the golden week and the plane was full of Japanese people.

I’m amazed at how cheap Australian hotels are compared to the Japanese ones.

I’m happy to spend a lot of money to travel overseas, but I don’t particularly enjoy going to restaurants in Japan which at this point of my life feel same old same old.

It’s a matter of priorities: if you spend money locally, you won’t have money to travel overseas.

Plus I don’t get this constant chase of higher inflation. How do they measure it? Because I’ve seen quite sizable price increases compared to two years ago, so the constant 2% that they bring up makes me think that they’re using the wrong calculation method.

150 yen and 160 yen per dollar are 6.7% difference. How could this not affect people? How about one reduces their salary by 6.7%: does it affect them?

developing an airplane from scratch is orders of magnitude harder than developing a car from scratch. China managed to do so by heavily relying on western technology. A consortium to achieve the same outcome feels very much like a cow which is to be milked as much as possible before disposing of it.

The consortium may be better off buying Embraer or Bombardier and rename it Mitsubishi something. That’d be far more successful.

Read the article,

I did and I was of the same idea when I wrote this article. PE's hard product improvement over economy is laughable and a waste of money. It's no wonder that PE and F are slowly dying. Polarization of income means that high-income people tend to fly J, middle income fly Y and low income fly LLCs. F adds very little to the J experience, especially if one's objective is to sleep on the plane. What is PE supposed to offer that Y cannot? A broccoli salad? Too little for the extra ask.

Maybe for the airlines you fly with, let me guess Southwest or United? 

Singapore Airlines is head and shoulders above either of those airlines, and I would say any American based airline as well!

This is worth the extra money!

He isn't wrong. Premium economy literally provides a service which is comparable to economy class (= same meals, and only 1 or 2 inches more of personal space) for a much higher price. I fly business when I can afford it or economy when I cannot. Would never dream of wasting money on PE. Unless PE provides lie-flat seats, it's a con job.

A lot of market speak but this might finally convince me to upgrade from my 9 year old workhorse MacBook Air.

I upgraded from an old intel to the top of the line MacBook Pro 16-inch 2 years ago. And it's been a great investment I don't regret at all. I won't replace my laptop until at least M5. But you will be suprised by performance and battery life improvements you'll get switching from an Intel MacBook Air.

Still this nonsense discussion.

1) it is impossible to claim that all those who disappeared have been abducted by North Koreans. Japan has its fair share of unsolved crimes.

2) what would the point be in North Korea refusing to return the abductees at this point? they’ve confirmed some of them had in fact been abducted and have been let go back to Japan.

Being stubborn doesn’t pay off at all. Japan would be better off lifting the sanctions and obtaining information through soft diplomacy.

What I find amusing is that while most condemn China's support for Russia during this unjustified invasion of a sovereign country, most people tend to forget how backstabbing India's foreign policy is. Not surprising, but this is why nobody is taking the world's biggest democracy seriously. At least China is open about its transactions/objectives.

Who wrote this article?

the guy didn’t leave a body on the road, he left a woman on the road where she was fatally hit by a taxi.

talking about a body fatally hit by a taxi doesn’t make sense.

What a sad event. Drivers in Mito and surrounding cities are the worst.

What is not being said is whether the dog has in fact rabies. That's the whole point. This article is nonsense.

totally unexpected.

All those days I used to go to the JAXA building at 3AM: good times! Nice to see this achievement. Per aspera ad astra!

Even after being here close to 20 years I still don’t understand why people wait in line for ages in all sorts of weather when they could get something just as good around the corner without the wait

Herd mentality and plenty of time to waste

Wow the comments... I'm sure some of you were loving the crypto/NFT craze just a few months ago. Of course, you wouldn't share with the rest of us how much money you lost, right?

never bought or intended to buy crypto. And I wouldn’t even call crypto a financial product.

that being said, it’s obvious there’s risk in investing, and one needs to judge whether they can bear that risk or not. Interest rates on bank accounts in Japan are basically 0%. I keep 6 months worth of salary in cash and the rest is invested. Everyone’s needs are different.

I made the call late last year that the Nikkei would test 40,000 points by the end of '24. It should come sooner!

Anyone with a pension or investment fund should be majorly cashing in. Put everything on stocks ASAP. Everyone has the chance now to retire rich!

I wish it were that easy. Unfortunately one can’t really withdraw money from their pension like in other countries. I see those as extra taxes on the paycheck rather than as an investment.

i wish they let people opt out should they wish to. I’d dump all the money in stocks 100%, but that wouldn’t feed into the Ponzi schemes pensions are.

Never made so much money in a week (I’m under 35).

very very very good time to invest.

Could you please tell me specifically what kind of system is the modern education system?

What is different from Japan's education system?

There are various issues facing Japan's education system, and if reforms occur, Japan's industry and economy will continue to develop.

There is no modern or old education system. There’s an education system which forces you to study to gain your degree, and an education system in which people are awarded degrees just because they attended classes and passed an extremely basic exam. Universities in Japan belong to the latter category (yes, one of my degrees is from the top university in the country so I know what I’m talking about).

Japan produces a lot of good research, but the amount of academic litter is equally gigantic, and this is partially caused by professors/students who would have no business being at a university in any other country.

If Japan‘s industry wants to thrive, a more meritocratic system needs to be implemented by universities, and larger investments should be provided to universities producing high-quality research.

Good luck to all.

However I wish Japan, as a major country, would have a way more modern Educational System, such as the European northern countries, where students actually learn something useful, that develops their minds too, not just learning to pass the exams by using endless memorization. 

Learning foreign languages are a proof of that, sadly...

universities in Northern European countries are notoriously garbage with the exclusion of 4 universities in the uk.

Congrats. What about the pets abandoned on the burning plane? If things were arranged differently, they could have been evacuated with their families.

I feel for those pet owners. I don't think I would ever recover from having my pets burning to death.

Those talking about pets as if they were the last of their thoughts during a crash probably never established a meaningful bond with theirs (if they ever had any).

Good. Arrest and deport to The Hague.

*if age

There are also good older drivers. On Jan 1 we went with an 80+ neighbor and her driving was first-class and safe.

then one could argue the opposite. If she cannot be a reason to withdraw one’s license, but only the capability to drive, why not letting 10-13y.o. kids drive? As long as they are tall enough to reach the pedals, that should be enough, right?

In many areas in Japan, public transportation can be really poor. So driving is the only option for people who live in those area. 

it’s up to the government to find a solution to this, either via the delivery of food or through the provision of transportation for the elderly. People above 75 have no business driving a car.