Japan

Oh ho, rumors that Japan is discussing removing the permanent visa status, and getting hard on immigration.

Rumors, and HR departments asking people to share their exact status, etc. Highly qualified colleague (HB-1 like) whose 5-year visa renewal has become one year despite marriage and child.

New government alright. But the mood is different this time.

Scientist and engineer interested in Life.

Work on (GOF)AI, Agriculture, Biology, Energy, Robotics, Space---all topics climate-aware.

Kuriyama, Yubari District, Hokkaido, Japan

I may be too old and “qualified” to worry about my status in Japan, but two things:

- who knows?
- this reminds of the taste of precarious life, that many people suffer far beyond personal experience, eg people in farming/construction in the US. To be honest just imagining what these people are living is disturbing when the taste lingers in the mind.

Delver at contraptions.venkateshrao.com, running summerofprotocols.com, host of /gloom ☀️

Indeed for Japan. It has never been really easy to come and stay. After a decade opening more (from circa 2014 many visa conditions were easier to meet), this may just be going back to the mean.

There is something different to me though, after more than two decades here, a different political+geopolitical context for sure, and different approach at addressing the situation.

Japan’s population remains old and getting older. There is no model that can claim the country can continue “well” without an influx of external people. Except far-right and dubious numbers based on using women.

Sigh

The US has been a historic outlier and most countries were always closer to closed than open. We may be regressing to the mean here.