My 2019 in FB

Posted on 2020/01/01 by fmu

January 12

Went to a talk by Steve Vogel the other evening. (Have to pick up a copy of his Marketcraft.) He basically said a liberal economy needs not the absence of regulations but the presence of regulations that encourage competition based on accountability and transparency. (This “transparency” is, I assume, transparency in the sense of open information such as would allow markets to function more perfectly.)

In listening to it, I kept thinking that regulatory reform is a bit akin to disruptive technology. It is not taking away the rules so much as it is changing the rules. Likewise, what is called deregulation is not so much de-regulation as it is different-regulation. Think of the Japanese postal system, for example.

In the end, his final slide was a plea for accountability, transparency, and diversity — and I wondered how on earth we can expect the government to actively promote these qualities when it has none of them itself.

January 25

Just as I find it interesting that the same LDP people who were so anxious to pass legislation based upon fraudulent and made-up data last year are now expressing themselves as outraged that the Health & Labor Ministry did not collect and compile accurate data for the last umpteen years, I also find it interesting that the same Korean government that talks about how everyone has to respect the independent judiciary’s decisions has arrested a former justice for not doing his job the way they think he should have.

January 26

Several weeks ago, I attended symposium where the keynote speaker seemed to refer to the nation-state as an object of natural loyalty and then use this conceit to argue against what he called the cosmopolitanism of globalism but what might better be called transnationalism. This struck me as odd, because I do not think of the state as a natural loyalty. I do not think of either nationalism or, his preferred term, patriotism as natural.

I can understand that loyalty to family is natural because one grows up depending upon the family (even if it is not the birth family) for so much. Likewise, I can understand loyalty to the culture one grew up in as natural because, growing up, one internalizes its customs and assumptions. (Note here that this “culture” itself is not an integral entity in that it has many different facets such as class, religion, and education, and the whole is simply the hash of these ingredients, different people emphasizing different aspects.) Yet the state, the flag-waving and other efforts it makes to become ingrained in the individual’s outlook and assumptions notwithstanding, is simply a political construct devised to facilitate expression of the shared culture, including promoting the culture and collecting/sheltering those who share it.

Hence the importance attached to assimilation when people move from one culture to another. (And hence the provisions for changing citizenship [nationality] when a person identifies more strongly with an acquired culture than with the birth/family culture.) And this primacy of culture is then the basis for objecting to massive immigration by people from a different culture (call it culture X) if/when they are perceived as seeking to preserve that different culture X despite having moved to a state grounded in culture Y. Small doses of culture X are readily/easily accepted, but resentment mounts when culture X people are perceived as wanting to preserve and spread their culture to the detriment of culture Y.

So rather than talk about nationalism, it might be more accurate to talk about culturalism; as well as to recognize that these cultural conflicts can also easily arise within a single nation when the people there do not actually share the same cultural assumptions. Likewise, people in different nations can well share the same cultural assumptions, which is sometimes termed globalism even though it is neither global nor an ism.

The fraying of cultural commonality in the EU and the US, the desire of Kurdish-culture people to have their own state, the determined effort China makes to impose Beijing’s culture on its ethnic minorities: All of these and more bear witness to the idea that “culture” is more important than its “nation” shell.

February 6

Installment whatever of the I’m-glad-I -don’t-have-to-translate-this-yet series: From the advertisement for the 前田・谷口 book「ハッキリ言わせていただきます」we have 世の中の動きを黙ってスルーしていると、いつのまにかおかしな方向に進んでいたり、重要な問題が議論なしで決まってしまったり。理不尽なことだらけの日本の社会に、関西出身の二人が激アツトークでツッコミを入れる。

February 20

All the refrigerators I see are designed to look like parking towers. Tall squares. When they really should be designed to mimic china cabinets or book shelves. Why? To lessen the likelihood there will be things sitting in the back for years on end. If you can’t/don’t see it, you will not remember it and will not use it until well past its expiry date. Yes, this would take more wall space, but it would not need to take more floor space. Any refrigerator companies out there want to try this?

February 25

Am thinking that, if Trump is smart, after the summit, he’ll say to Kim: “Kim, baby. You had a long train ride. And it’ll be just as long on the way home. Why not save some time? I’ll give you a ride on Air Force One. Drop you off in the big P, and then I continue on to DC.” Would give Trump a visit to NK with no talks planned. Would show the two as best friends forever. Would make up for the lack of summit substance or, if there is substance, would reinforce the substance. Great theater. And theater is what Trump does.

April 1

I’m reading all the comments (the various motivations people are reading into Reiwa), and I’m wondering how many times the era name has been evoked to justify/compel a particular policy. Can’t think of any. When was Heisei cited to back calls for making peace, for example? None that I remember. So I’m not worried about the intent behind the name. More concerned about the intent behind the current government’s policies (that started in the current era regardless of the name). The name is like a ribbon, and what it’s pinned on is more important.

April 4

Of course the Nissan police are not going to say they re-arrested him to keep him from holding a press conference next week, but . . .
Wonder if he gets his old room back.

April 12

I am not a big Koike (Tokyo Governor) fan, but I was glad to see that she/Tokyo opted out of the furusato tax scheme that lets people send their local tax payments to someplace they don’t live (and may well have zero connection with), get a “thank you” worth up to 30% of the payment amount, and then deduct the full amount (minus a token Y2,000) from their local tax payment. In effect, this is a system encouraging people in urban areas to subsidize rural areas, and it is a disaster for such local tax districts as Chiyoda, Setagaya, and Shibuya. If people want to send money to rural areas by buying stuff at three times what it costs, that’s fine. But there is no reason the whole urban area should subsidize this. Good for Koike/Tokyo for speaking out against this system.

May 4

I know it has only been a week, but I really wish people would get over this “new era” business. Not only the media people desperate for a hook to hang non-news on, but politicians and ordinary people as well. Because it is not a “new era.” It is simply a new era name.

Looking back at previous “new eras,” the coup that started “the Meiji era” was not so much a change of policy as it was some different people carrying out policies that the Tokugawa folks had already started. Things like industrialization, “modernization,” and diplomatic relations to stave off colonization. The new government did not, after all, expel the barbarians or anything.

Then the change from Meiji to Taisho. Doubtless much gnashing of teeth at the loss of a venerated emperor, but no substantive policy changes. And then the sighs of relief when the nominal era changed from Taisho to Showa.

Within living memory for most of us is the change from Showa to Heisei. This was cosmetically significant because it ushered in a new emperor untainted by wartime guilt. But it did not mark a change of government or significant policy changes. The Soviet Union’s implosion was more significant in policy terms.

So why should we assume this year’s new name justifies radical policy changes such as amending the Constitution? The Meiji Constitution was not adopted simultaneous with the Meiji Restoration. And none of the subsequent era-name changes triggered Constitutional changes. The current Constitution was adopted not at the start of the Showa era but at the end of a war in the middle of the Showa era. The era name is independent of policy, so let’s quit this “new era” circus and tone down the hype, lest it be used for nefarious ends.

May 14

The cosplay aside, how can you expect to be taken seriously when one of your core rituals involves divination with a tortoise shell?

May 18

I understand why the Ishin people (who call themselves the Japan Innovation Party) were so anxious to purge Maruyama Hodaka (rather than let him resign) for his comments on the option of taking the Northern Territories back by force (戦争で). They want to put as much distance as possible between them and him, and they do not want people to identify him with the party (even though he was a party member when he made the furor-inducing comments and even though the comments were very much in the style of the party, a party that was, after all, founded by Hashimoto Toru). And by extension, I understand why they would want to be at the forefront of calling for him to resign from the Diet.

After all, the mere mention of going to war is one of Japanese politics’ third rails. Even back when Tokyo Governor Minobe declared his ゴミ戦争 war on garbage, the LDP and other anti-Minobe forces made a great show of being shocked that anyone would use the term 戦争 (war), even though it was obviously not a military war.

And I sort of understand that the other opposition parties in the Diet would be willing to go along with the Ishin’s distancing game because it offers a way to put the LDP-Komei people on a spot and Effective and cheap Kamagra has sildenafil overnight shipping challenged the medicine and become second best care to treat all symptoms of erectile dysfunction. Yoga is generally polished for keeping up free tadalafil sample body quality, adaptability and adjust so don’t be amazed if notwithstanding ending up impractically prepared, you end up feeling drowsy after their use. For more on IVF treatment options like ,Way to parenthood with Sperm Banking, sperm banking cost, sperm storage,Human Sperm Banking,Sperm Banking and Sperm Donation,IVF Doctors and fertility spebuy sildenafil canada t from India. Usually, a Tramadol pain relief treatment requires the patients to take a single dose, which has to be exercised completely with enough amount of cost viagra online http://icks.org/n/data/ijks/1482467975_add_file_5.pdf water without chewing or crushing. discomfort them. If war cannot even be spoken of, what does it mean for when Abe speaks out in vigorous support of Trump’s “all options are on the table”? And what does Abe’s desire to exert “maximum pressure” on North Korea mean when laying siege (now called applying sanctions) is a standard military tactic in war?

Still, I am more sympathetic to the LDP “let’s not be hasty” position than to the Ishin “off with his seat” position. Because I can too easily see that same logic being applied to some other Diet member (or ordinary person) who might say something that is wildly unpopular at the moment. For example, someone who might suggest that Japan’s Imperial institutions are outmoded and unnecessary.

Plus, there is the Constitutional stipulation that a member of the Diet “shall not be held liable outside the House for speeches, debates or votes cast inside the House.” If he had posed the same question in the Diet, it would have been protected. If it would have been protected in the Diet, should he really be stripped of his Diet seat for saying it outside the Diet?

Yes, by all means drum him out of the party if you wish (including throwing him under the bus so as not to derail the negotiations with Russia), but depriving him of his Diet seat seems a bit extreme. By all means, campaign against him in the next election, but is the comment really that much worse than, for example, the other Diet members’ massive financial irregularities that have essentially gone unpunished?

May 21

「GDP年率2.1％増」なんちゃって

May 27

I notice that at least one place is interpreting Trump’s “Great progress being made in our Trade Negotiations with Japan. Agriculture and beef heavily in play. Much will wait until after their July elections where I anticipate big numbers!” as meaning デカイものを手に入れた. I disagree and instead think the “big numbers” refer to expecting the LDP to win heavily. He is, after all, talking with Abe. What do you think? (And I think the “great progress” is at least half wishful thinking for his domestic fan base.)

May 29

There was someone at JAT wondering what to do when a slow spell hits. Thinking about that, I wondered if anyone does volume discounts. Not under duress but as a marketing ploy. Put is on your business card: Volume discounts available. Inquire within.

For example, list price for the first million yen of work, 2% off on the next million, another 2% off on the next million, and on up until you hit ten million, at which point it levels off. With these discounts on a billings-per-year basis. Think of it as a loyalty program.

June 7

I am reading something that asks, in a chapter title, “did Japan have any other alternative?” And it occurs to me this really means “did Japan have any alternative?” Because to talk about “other alternatives” is to imply that what was done was an alternative — an option — and did not need to have

June 28

So the question to keep in mind as you watch/read/listen to the news: How is my life better — how is the global outlook improved — as a result of this G20 photo op?

July 11

This “coalition of the willing” or “coalition of the strong-armed” or whatever it’s called would be a little more credible if the United States were not making the problems worse in the first place by unilaterally dropping out of agreements such as the nuclear deal with Iran.

August 2

It is interesting how the good-manner nannies in the government want to discourage people from eating while walking, and at the same time Abe and friends want to charge you 2% extra for sitting down and eating your junk food in the restaurant.

October 3

Note to Kansai Electric Power: If “I gave it back” were a defense, every shoplifter who got caught could simply return the stuff s/he was caught with and all would be forgiven.

October 14

Is it too much to hope the J govt and business might take 19’s hint and shift the policy priority to reducing carbon emissions, reducing plastic use, and doing a few of the many other things that might contribute to slowing the pace of climate change?

October 28

Monday morning musing: I’m reading a book that starts off (first page) “We are living through the sixth mass extinction driven by the limitless greed of the 1 per cent, their blindness to the ecological limits the earth set and the limits set by social justice and human rights.” and, while I sympathize with this “the 1%” idea in that there are unconscionable wealth/income inequalities, I wonder if raging at the 1% is not counter-productive (assuming rage is not the purpose) in that it seems to absolve the rest of us who are comfortably playing along with the consumerism that feeds their avarice.

October 30

今日は渋谷 Scramble Square の祝賀会等に出席し、色々と楽しみました。11月1日オープンする東口地下広場の pre-opening talk show では「渋谷はもはや若者の街ではない」という指摘がありました。若者の街でないならば、どういう街にすべきかという話題中心の talk show でしたが、やはり多様性重視の街です。多面性のある街です。結構フリーな街で自分の様々な可能性を再発見出来る街です。私なりに言えば「若者の街ではないが、来街者が若返る街」になって欲しいです。

October 31

Thinking a bit more about the IOC decision to move the 2020 marathon to Sapporo, I wonder if this precedent will be extended. In the present case, apparently, Sapporo did not submit a bid or put itself forth as a candidate. The IOC simply appointed/anointed it to host the marathon. Following that precedent, it would make sense for cities to not bother submitting official proposals/bids but to simply wait to be appointed. In 2024, for example, the IOC could simply appoint City X. Lausanne, for example. The fact that some other city may have submitted a proposal/bid and been accepted is irrelevant. Lausanne is more convenient or something, so the city that thought it would host the games is bumped in favor of Lausanne. And instead of calling them the Olympic Games we call them the Olympic Fun and Games.

November 5

Working on a translation and came across a passage saying of Japanese escalator manners 「人々が意識的に両側に腰を下ろして、真ん中を通路用に空けている」. All kinds of problems here. We don’t sit on the escalator. There are no three-lane escalators where people could sit on both sides and leave a middle lane open. So what to do?

Because this is a J2E translation of a book that was translated from Chinese, I asked the client to check the Chinese. Is this really what the Chinese says, or is this a mistranslation? Turns out it is what the Chinese says.

Now what? After not thinking about this for several days, i have an answer I like: First, get rid of the sitting. Assume that just means not walking and is in the “make themselves comfortable” sense. I think we can do that without being accused of mistranslating, especially since it makes the author look a little better informed. But what about the three lanes? Even though it says “middle lane,” I am going to ignore that (again, there is no need to raise red flags in the reader’s mind) and interpret this 両側 as not happening at the same time, which is really the key. In Tokyo, we stand on the left. Osaka apparently stands on the right. So this is that people stand on either side, leaving space for people who are in a hurry to walk.

November 22

If I sell my daughter a condo for 1/10th of market value, the tax office is going to correctly conclude that the other 9/10 was a gift and she is going to be subject to the gift tax. (NB: I do not have a daughter. This is a hypothetical situation.) So if a hotel hosts an event for a politician and only charges 1/10th of the market value, it would be reasonable to conclude that the other 9/10 was a political contribution and should show up on the politician’s accounting sheet. Especially since failure to list contributions over a certain amount (an amount much less than the rental value of that party room at the Otani, for example) is a serious lapse.

November 24

I am wondering why so many companies have online stores where they pretend to sell their stuff for more than it costs at the local big-chain supermarket (and I consider Amazon a big-chain supermarket that has delivery service). Why bother?

December 5

行政文書のバックアップが行政文書ではないとすれば、公文書のコピーが公文書ではなく、いわゆる「漏洩」されても何ら問題はないでしょうか。

December 18

In reporting on people, for example, people taking money from business and other interests, it would be very helpful if the media would identify them not as “former” (元) secretary to this or that politician but as “at the time” (当時) secretary to the politician. Likewise with former baseball players taking drugs, for example, but it is the former secretaries and former employees who need this identification most. (We can look up baseball players’ careers.)

Note

There was, of course, much more as I engaged in discussions that I and other people had started, but these are the things I thought worth posting as starters.

Posted in Japanese Politics, Other Politics | Leave a comment

“No” is not a negotiation ploy

Posted on 2019/11/22 by fmu

Most freelancers feel a little short of work when they first go freelance. True, there are some who go freelance because they have so much work from so many different clients that they have outgrown the confines of single-employer employment. They are, however, more the exception than the rule. For most of us, abandoning the perceived security of a stable workflow (or more accurately, a stable income) induces an anxious willingness to take on any and all comers and its corollary inability to turn down an assignment.

Unfortunately, this initial anxiety is habit-forming, and even busy freelancers find it difficult to turn down the prospect of more money, however meager. So they get busy, and busier, and frazzled, and burned out. But they still cannot get off the treadmill. Because what if there is no work next week? What if I end up homeless and my family leaves me because I’m a miserable person? What if I starve to death and nobody notices? The “what if”s are endless. So is the frazzle.

Stop. This is not the freedom you signed up for when you went freelance. Say no. If you are that busy now, odds are you are not going to suddenly have a years-long dry spell just because you say “no” once in a while. Besides, if you are that busy, you cannot do your best work for this additional client anyway. And not doing your best work is going to damage your reputation more than the occasional “no” is. So do yourself a favor and say no.

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“I’m sorry, but no. I cannot do this. I just do not have the time to do it justice.” If you say this, it is possible the would-be client will offer more money. Do not take it. You have said you do not have the necessary time. That time is already committed to another job, another client. To change your mind for more money is to say you are willing to break your word to that other client—willing to betray the client for money. And if you are willing to do that to client A, who is to say you are not willing to do it to client B, or client C, and on down the line? Do you really want to tell a potential client that you cannot be trusted to keep your word? When you get to No, it has to mean No. If you think you might be able to squeeze the job in, ask for a rush surcharge. Thirty percent sounds reasonable. So does fifty percent. Or even double. If the job is doable under the right conditions, go ahead and push for the right conditions. But if you are really too busy to do it, you are too busy to do it no matter how much money is on the table. Because your credibility is also on the table.

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By any other name

Posted on 2023/11/17 by fmu

Something I wrote for the Japan Association of Translators’ annual anthology, 2023 edition:

I hear a lot of people saying ChatGPT and other large language models are going to drive us all out of business. (Disclaimer: I have already retired, so that “us” is rhetorical.) After all, they can parse source text and come up with reasonable-looking translations. Sure, they make mistakes. Sure, they leave things out. But so do we. That’s why both they and we need checkers and editors. The big difference is that they can work sooo much faster and sooo much cheaper that there’s not going to be any room left for the rest of us.

Of course, this is pretty much the same thing I was hearing when machine translation was being hyped 30 or whatever years ago. Fast, cheap, consistent. The Yoshinoya model. Going to drive all the other restaurants out of business. Except it didn’t.

But this time it’s different, this time’s for real, they say. And yes, the results look good, look threatening. But that does not mean there is nothing left for the I-am-not-a-robot crowd. Rather, it should be prompting us to rethink what we are doing and to upgrade our positions, even if that ends up with us doing essentially the same core stuff packaged differently.

You’re a translator, right? Tell me what a translator does without using the word “translate.” You take a message written by a specific person/organization to be read by and impact another specific person/organization (often in the plural) in a specific way and you recast it to do the same thing (have the same impact) for a different target audience in a different language (where “language” can well include the non-verbal). Do we have to call that translation? No. It is much bigger than most people’s conception of translation. It is content packaging. It is messaging. If you get to the client before the source text is finalized―or if you assume considerable leeway on the output end―it can be communication design. It really doesn’t matter what you call it, so long as you get beyond word substitution.

Nor does it matter what you call the company you cloak yourself in. Call it Going Live. Call it Settoku Station. Advantedge. More Than. Call it whatever you like―aware that what you call it will influence how people see it, hint at what you actually want to do, and probably be sufficiently singular that the many AI programs do not claim to be doing it. Why restrict yourself to the “translator” label?

The question is not whether you can survive as a narrow-definition translator. The question is how you get people to keep paying you to do what you want to do. How do you package what you want to do so it looks like something they really should be asking/paying you to do because it is such an essential service and nobody else is even close to as good at it as you are? LLMs may have landscaped the playing field, but they have not ended the game.

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Time Out

Posted on 2023/02/15 by fmu

Prompted by a “suggested for you” thing in Facebook in which a physicist explains why time only moves forward and not backward, I have been thinking about time and have decided that time does not move in any direction at all. It just is. In fact, “time” is an artificial abstract that we have devised to think we understand — to be comfortable with — this ever-changing present

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Status

Posted on 2022/11/01 by fmu

Just a quick note to declare that I am officially retired. This does not mean anything to other people, but to me it means I am not doing any for-pay work. Have not done any so far this year and do not plan to do any in the remaining two months. I am keeping busy with other things, but not work to earn money. Drawing down assets instead. After all, at 80, I doubt I have many more than two decades left anyway.

Now that I have lost your attention, I want to mention the Unification Church. As everyone knows, former Prime Minister Abe was shot by a male who felt the UC had ruined his chances in life (by draining his family fortunes) and considered Abe a major figure lending credence to it. He said he really wanted to kill the church leaders, but Abe was as close as he could get. This murder highlighted the ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) ties to the UC and unleashed a backlash that reverberates even now with LDP figures, for the most part, apologizing for their coziness and vowing to do better (“better” in this case meaning cutting ties with the UC). Indeed, there are strong calls for the government to void the UC’s status (tax exemptions) as a religious organization. But, but, the LDP and its apologists say, the government should not be meddling in religious affairs. But, but, but UC critics say, the UC should be stripped of status not because of its religious beliefs but because it is a criminal organization. This is still playing out.

Many other things are also in play, but that is enough for today.

Posted in Japanese Politics | Leave a comment

Abe Shinzo

Posted on 2022/08/01 by fmu

It does not bother me that former Prime Minister Abe Shinzo is dead.

What bothers me is that he was shot. This is not supposed to happen in Japan. That said, there are two redeeming features here. One is that he was not shot over his politics. This was not a political assassination. Instead, it was a revenge killing. The killer’s mother had apparently fallen under the Unification Church’s sway, donated everything she had to the Church, and as a side-result derailed the killer’s prospects. So he decided to strike back at the Church. And when no high Church officials were available, he went for a prominent celeb who had been pimping for the Church and buttressing its credibility: Abe.

The other redeeming feature is that this has thrown the Church’s involvement in Japanese politics into the public headlights, and it turns out Abe was not the only one with close ties to the Church. So the Church’s ideology, fund-raising, and more are once again being talked about and politicians are being called upon to sever their ties to this criminal organization. Most of the politicians are LDP people, but it is by no means an LDP monopoly.

Amidst all of this, the Kishida Cabinet made a rush decision to give Abe a state funeral. This has not been popular, and it has seriously damaged the Cabinet’s approval rating. This, too, might be counted as a redeeming feature. Anything that gets the LDP out of its “we won” bubble is a good thing. Even if the outrage dies down with the media’s effort to distract it by providing other news and spectacle, the opposition to a state funeral for this former prime minister should be a wake-up call.

The Komei people, backed by their own religious cult with its own unsavory history, are, understandably, trying to stay out of the limelight.

Posted in J-culture notes, Japanese Politics | Leave a comment

Health Insurance Tweaks

Posted on 2021/10/22 by fmu

Back again, this time with a few suggestions on how to make the national health insurance system better. It is already good, but I am thinking “better.”

1. Consolidate the systems. As I understand this, there are basically three systems now: one for government employees and other people who work at large organizations, another for everybody else under 75, and then another for people 75 and older. First, the only reason for the 75+ grouping is that it is assumed these people cost more, the under-75s don’t want to pay it, so we separate them off. But in the hope everyone will get that old, and in the realization that these people paid their premiums even when they were not costing the system much if anything (which is the way insurance works), there is no good reason to cordon them off when they start costing the system money. Then there is the other division, which is essentially one of who pays the premiums. Big organizations pay half the premiums for their low-risk people. Gig workers, for example, pay the full premium themselves. But that is an irrelevant distinction. The system should not care who pays the premium and should instead work to expand the pool. Include everyone. Make it truly one national system with the same premiums and the same coverage for everyone regardless of age, employment status, or other factors.

2. Similarly, the 75+ group now has three co-pay ranks: 10%, 20%, and 30%. Once the systems are consolidated, everyone should also have the same co-pay stages depending upon income.

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3. More than that, there should be a 0% co-pay stage for people who are just barely, if at all, making ends meet. Otherwise, these people do not go to the doctor until they have to be admitted as emergency cases, the hospital ends up waiving their fees, and these costs then get passed along to other patients (a much smaller pool than the national system). Since a healthy population is in society’s best interests, it would be better for society as a whole to cover these people’s costs by making sure they are enrolled and making their co-pay zero.

4. And finally, expand coverage to include such prevention measures as health check-ups and vaccinations. It is a truism that prevention is cheaper than treatment. So expanding coverage to include prevention will end up saving the system money. (I am just thinking of things doctors/hospitals do and not your fitness gym, jogging shoes, otc vitamin pills, or the like.)

I think these tweaks would make the system better and end up costing everyone less on average, but mine is an ordinary-voter perspective and I would be interested in hearing what experts and other people think, if you care to comment.

Posted in Japanese Politics | Leave a comment

Election Economics

Posted on 2021/10/20 by fmu

Kishida is talking about tweaking the economy — but saying the specifics will not come until after the election (meaning he wants you to sign the blank check before he fills in the amount) — so I have a few suggestions for tweaking taxation.

1. Rather than just changing the taxation of capital gains, put all income together and tax it on a progressive schedule. It really doesn’t matter if you are farming, building houses, filing lawsuits, collecting rent/dividends, or what. Sure, different activities have different costs that can be expensed, but what you are left with is the same: money. Total it all up and tax it.

2. Get rid of the consumption/sales tax in all of its regressive glory and reinstitute excise taxes (more properly named excess taxes?) on things people don’t really need — things like pearl necklaces — with the same tax on the same product regardless of where it originated. (Speaking of which, alcohol should be taxed the same by volume regardless of whether the alcohol is in beer, whiskey, sake, wine, or whatever.)

3. Get rid of the furusato nozei system that encourages people to send their tax money to buy things on the cheap while impoverishing the communities where they live and where they benefit from government spending that they avoid financing.

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4. Treat all political organizations like family business companies. They have income. Account for all of it. They have expenses. Document them all. And if they show a profit at the end of the year, tax it. If someone who owns shares (e.g., the politician) retires or dies and those shares pass to someone else, tax the transfer as a gift or inheritance. Not only would this perhaps make political financing more transparent, it might even lessen the inherited-seat advantage.

5. Get serious about property tax collection. If a land/home owner dies, someone inherits the property. Send the bill. If it is not paid, follow up. There is no reason there should be vast numbers of “we don’t know who owns it” properties.

Other people here will have other ideas, and some of these idea may well involve explaining why my ideas are wrong-headed. Great. Feel free to add/subtract as you wish.

Posted in Japanese Politics | Leave a comment

Godiva vs Hershey

Posted on 2021/10/03 by fmu

I did the first part of my growing up in Pittsburgh, where both pickles and ketchup are Heinz. And much of the chocolate was Hershey’s. However, my dad also liked chocolate and there were always a couple of bars of Baker’s Chocolate around. True, the Baker’s Chocolate cost more, but it was better. And then I did some more growing up in college before coming to Japan and continuing to grow up. This is an on-going process.

Along the way, I lucked out with some very good clients who furthered the process, including showing me how to think about some things, including both being willing to pay for value when it is important and positioning myself as value that is worth paying for. Part of this was deciding that I did not want to do anybody-can-do-it work. And then pricing my services appropriately—which means pricing them so that people would only ask me to do things that are important to them. Like going to Europe with groups of businessmen, not because I was the interpreter or the tour conductor or anything but just so I’d be there and could take care of whatever might happen. Like 30-page policy speeches that have to be translated, client-checked, put back into real English, and ready for distribution in two days or so. And like a lot of other things.

Of course, this cuts both ways. When sending thank-you gifts to people, send stuff that indicates you think they are important. Not waxy Hershey’s chocolates from Don Quixote but Godiva from the Godiva shop, for example. Godiva costs more. But the fact that everybody knows it costs more means it has more value—is worth more—as a gift. Perception counts. (I am reminded of the Johnnie Walker story. Johnnie Walker Black Label used to be the prime gift in Japan. But then the non-Japanese brewers complained about the high tariffs, the Japanese government lowered the tariffs, Johnnie Walker slashed its prices, and lost vast expanses of market share because it was no longer a prestige brand. Perception counts.)

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What does this mean for us as translators? It means perception counts. How are you perceived? As someone who will work for bottom-feeder rates, presumably because that’s the only work you can get? Or as someone who charges premium rates, presumably because you provide a premium product? And while some of this is product, much of it is packaging. Are you a “this is what it’ll cost you” person or a “please throw me some crumbs” person? I know the market has changed somewhat since I moved off the front lines, but I suspect this principle still applies. Translation is translation but the translation business is still a business. Part of how you get where you want to be is assuming—and projecting an image conducive to other people’s assuming—you are already there.

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(originally written for the Japan Association of Translators (JAT) 2021 Translator Perspectives anthology)

Posted in Translation | Leave a comment

Restoring Democracy

Posted on 2020/07/13 by fmu

Sometime in late June, an American acquaintance asked how one (re)creates trust in government. My reply was:

Be honest. Be open. Do not manipulate the data. Do not pack the cabinet and the rest of the bureaucracy with friends whose primary qualification for the job seems to be their friendship with and loyalty to the person who appoints them. Admit that the government is “only human” and makes mistakes. But it is also more than human in that it is working not for its own benefit (much less the benefit of this or that government official, including his/her friends) but for everyone’s benefit.

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Specifically: restore progressive taxation, make unredacted information available, get big money out of politics (e.g., by outlawing all organizational donations), have officials meet with the public more (including streamed meetings with small groups), ensure voting is an easy process open to all, trust the people, recognize that “the people” are not “the enemy,” and more. Essentially, the stance should be “I’m part of the community. I’m a neighbor.”

Trust cannot be decreed. It has to be built. And building trust has to be a long-term process by, for, and of “we the people.”

Posted in Other Politics | Leave a comment