Serious post - fucking sad about Hongo tragedy

[wangta]

Just read news posted on jp today - a woman hanged herself after killing her 3 kids in Hongo, Bunkyo Ward. Apparently 'economic despair' has been linked to her suicide and the murder of her kids. Damn, I just feel haunted by this, getting so down about J people killing themselves or their families or both over money problems, debts, or things that they just can't talk about or get help for.

Aussies may be cunts who believe they're entitled to live a middle class life when they aint or have champagne tastes on a beer income but I'd much rather pay for that than have people kill themselves over money problems. Some arseholes in the comments section are hating on the mother but I can't judge her. Maybe she and her husband were up to it in debt to yaks and she thought killing her kids was going to spare them trauma in life.

Maybe she was just poor, maybe her husband wasn't good to her or drank away/gambled away the family money. Japan taxes people who earn relative pittances - in Oz you aint paying tax earning 18,000 bucks or so and under. The system sucks here in many ways so does the illusion/delusion of 'we Japanese' as a big community when in fact the selfishness and coldness of in-group versus out-group shows up everyday in Tokyo to name one city. Fuck the social attitudes here where I've seen a homeless man looking like he was dying on Meiji Dori and I was the only one trying to get him some medical care. RIP to that poor woman and her kids.

[Grumpy Gramps]

All things considered, life sometimes just isn't worth the effort. It surely took a lot of guts to do what this woman did, but maybe it really was her only viable solution; everything else would just have been a never ending stream of pain for her and the kids.

Sure, the other guy, who just blew a few billion bucks on a tour around the moon might have been able to help her and many others, but that's not how life works.

[wagyl]

While Japan's suicide rate of 14.3 per 100,000 is greater than that of, for example, Australia at 11.7, it is less than many other countries, including Belgium or South Korea. Those figures, their accuracy, and underlying reasons for them can be argued at length, without leading to any actual solutions.

Where I do want to pull you up, Wangta, is this claim about superior and poverty-friendly income tax regime in Australia. A person in Japan with an income equivalent to the current Australian tax exempt income level of AUD 18,200; JPY 1,500,000, pays national and municipal tax of about 50,000 Yen for the year. Sure, it is not zero, but it is also little more than two annual NHK satellite fees, to put that in perspective. From where I look at it, there doesn't seem to be much difference between the two tax regimes, in a kindness/cruelness continuum.

[wangta]

While Japan's suicide rate of 14.3 per 100,000 is greater than that of, for example, Australia at 11.7, it is less than many other countries, including Belgium or South Korea. Those figures, their accuracy, and underlying reasons for them can be argued at length, without leading to any actual solutions.

Where I do want to pull you up, Wangta, is this claim about superior and poverty-friendly income tax regime in Australia. A person in Japan with an income equivalent to the current Australian tax exempt income level of AUD 18,200; JPY 1,500,000, pays national and municipal tax of about 50,000 Yen for the year. Sure, it is not zero, but it is also little more than two annual NHK satellite fees, to put that in perspective. From where I look at it, there doesn't seem to be much difference between the two tax regimes, in a kindness/cruelness continuum.

Absolutely disagree with you there. A person on an income like 18,000 bucks or less per year in Oz doesn't have the stress of trying to pay monthly health insurance payments, national pension payments and then the not-monthly citizens' tax which actually is like the equivalent of property tax in Oz. But in Oz only land/flat/apartment/owners pay property tax. And that shitload of financial payments comes in Japan BEFORE rent, gas, water, living expenses etc kick in.

It's tough, really tough to pay all that on a small monthly income. Which is why in Australia you don't. In fact it would be considered gob smackingly inequitable and actually cruel to charge people on these kind of incomes taxes each month. Your national health charges are called Medicare in Oz and they are calculated one time a year at tax time.

If you don't make a reasonable salary and 18,000 bucks aint, your Medicare levy is about zero and if you have to pay it, you don't get monthly charges. The tax office calculates at tax time and that is taken off your refund or you don't get a refund or whatever. Even 25,000 bucks income a year in Oz is considered a near poverty line level. Oh yeah, and around 30,000 bucks income per year and under will get you discounted transportation fees, utility bills, and a raft of other concessions.

In Japan it's just sweet to charge you monthly taxes on those amounts, especially the pittances. If you want to have a real life with some money to actually eat well and that doesn't mean Daiso Lawson, go out a bit, pay for some entertainment, have a phone, have a net connection, not be worried about making it through the month cause you get paid the month after, but hand over a lot of your small salary each month in Japanese taxes as well as those costs and your unavoidable rent etc, then damn it's hard for people earning 200,000 to 250,00 yen and less. That is one of the facts of life that sucks deep fried dog's balls here.

For the record my first year in Tokyo I earned around 1,700,000 yen. My national health bill the next year was around 13,000 yen plus per month, my citizens' tax was around 70,000 yen. If I'd been a sucker and paid the pension that would have been about 15,000 yen per month or whatever amount they extort for it these days.

Do the maths - even without the pension that was hard to pay. It is inequitable, especially when you consider they fix the highest amount somebody pays for National Health Insurance at around 600,000 yen per year I think. How the fuck is a low income earner paying more than 150,000 yen a year when you can earn much more and it's capped at that kind of low level for much higher earners?

Just saying facts here. Japan taxes low income earners disproportionately high and no it can't be compared any way to Oz's system which has inbuilt equity measures.

[wangta]

All things considered, life sometimes just isn't worth the effort. It surely took a lot of guts to do what this woman did, but maybe it really was her only viable solution; everything else would just have been a never ending stream of pain for her and the kids.

Sure, the other guy, who just blew a few billion bucks on a tour around the moon might have been able to help her and many others, but that's not how life works.

True. A different culture where there are so many church and secular charities who don't make you feel bad or beholden for getting their considerable assistance, very quietly and tactfully, maybe could have made a difference.

My olds are religious and have always done volunteer work staffing secondhand shops where needy people of any background/religion/non-religion can not only get good cheap necessities but also further support. Some big supermarkets in Oz accept these organisations' vouchers and people can shop and buy whatever food they like, the removal of the 'undeserving' or 'deserving' attitudes help a lot. These kinds of organisations also can help with access to counseling and a shitload of other services.

I would fucking hate to be a person of generational non-wealth and little to no opportunities or somebody who has fallen on hard times in Japan. The general attitude is that people can suck up lying on a blue mat near the train station or going into horrible death-like spasms just down the road from Harajuku with literally hundreds of people ignoring you or being part of a family that for generations had no opportunities to get better education and break out of the cycle of non-chances.

For a so-called middle class society here I've observed a lot of class divisions in Japan, especially Tokyo. You see them in our cuntries too but the stakes of failure or failure to get out of a lower economic position here are too high. The ward offices aint the answer - some of their 'compliance' workers just persecute people who have fallen on hard times or really can't do much cause of psychological problems.

Maybe you heard of the case in Kanagawa where one ward office's staff had jackets made basically saying they were the 'Anti Scum' taskforce or something similar. Their job was to check on people receiving welfare. No wonder some Japanese kill themselves rather than ask for financial or other help.