Slashdot Mirror
Japanese Anime Industry In Danger Of Fragmentation
ChibiOne writes "The Asahi Shinbun has a story about the critical state that the Japanese animation industry currently faces, claiming: 'As merchandisers grow rich, the animation industry is losing jobs to cheaper labor abroad.' The article quotes Oh Production President Koichi Murata as saying: 'Unless something is done, Japanese anime will be ruined.' An animator, toiling away on cels in a tiny Tokyo studio, might be fortunate to pull in just 50,000 yen [about $500 USD] a month."
to get the first post
anime canime
My character went abrouad and all I got was this...
After all, the problem isn't that wages are falling, the problem is that people are losing jobs.
Do you really think you can keep everyone believing that lie until the election? That's hardly the only headline like that, and the Kerry campaign has to comeup with some awfully convaluted metrics to portray otherwise.
If we are going to have fiscal and monetary policies that force the worst-off Americans to sacrifice to help the rest of the world, then we need redistribute incomes in this country. Otherwise, your complaints about the selfishness of American workers are very deceitful.
Who's interested in having American workers sacrifice anything? See the article I linked to above. There's plenty of good work that can't be shipped overseas because foreign workforces simply aren't up to the task, skills or education wise.
And how will it help a damn thing to redistribute income in this country, at least anymore than it already has? I don't know about other people, but I work hard so I'm rewarded. If I don't get the fruits of my labor, why should I work hard at all? If the government took more and more of my money as my paycheck increased, that would greatly lessen my motivation to increase it. Work twice as hard for only 1/4 more pay after your wealth redistribution scheme takes the rest?
I don't think so. Self interest is a rather simple instinct, and making the most of that drive is how America got to be top dog in the first place. You propose to kill the goose that keeps laying golden eggs.
Or subsidize health care and education like Europe and Canada.
Their socialized health care systems are swirling down the drains of decay since they implemented the system you think is so wonderful. When you seperate the decision to pay for services so far from the decision to seek services, you raise demand while restricting supply, and everything goes to shit. Really, look into it. Socialized health care is an abject failure.
As for education, we already subsidize education here, and you know how that's working out. We've got HS kids who can't do trig, and college kids who waste all their time studying failed ideologies and advocating silly political causes instead of studying a worthwhile subject that will make them more valuable to the workforce.
Or eliminate regressive Social Security taxes. How about just elimanating social security over the next few decades before the system implodes? The financial future of SS is grim.
Or make regular income taxes more progressive. Back to my previous point. If the government takes all or most of the increase people get from working harder, they won't have any reason to do so.
The only selfishness I see are those at the top of the American pyramid stealing the last few scraps of bread from those at the bottom. Spoken like someone who's never taken an economics class, or even put the slightest bit of thought into the matter.
Have you ever stopped to consider how even those who rate as 'poor' in the united states typically have a TV, plenty to eat (obesity is the number one health problem of the poor), and a car? How the 100+ million people today who qualify as middle class live in comfort royalty didn't have 150 years ago, even though there was but the tiniest fraction of them?
If the rich must steal from the poor to get richer, WHERE THE FUCK DID WE STEAL all that money from? Who do I steal money from, now that I've graduated college and earn 7 times what I did while in college? Who does Bill Gates steal money from, because even though he's the richest man in the US, the poor haven't gotten worse at all in the decades since microsoft started- and he's made plenty of millionares with him at said company.
Answer: I create wealth, I don't steal it. Bill Gates created a tremendous amount of wealth, and he kept a good portion of it. I make electricity so factories can use it to make
Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms should be the name of a store, not a government agency.