Asahi News : U.N. ranks Japan 11th in world for quality of life
I find it strange that the quality of life in Japan should have decreased so much from 1990 to 2005. When I see the buildings built before 1990, and those being built now, I can see a tremendous improvement.
Women rights and working conditions have also improved. Women are less shy to denounce harassement or molestations, get married later and more have real careers. Koizumi's recent reshuffle of the LDP has included more female politicians than ever in Japanese history.
Japanese people are also travelling more, and more speak English than in the past.
In my opinion, the quality of life in Japan was just overestimated in 1990 rather than it having decreased since then.
This is due to the education system that does not put much value in learning for itself, as opposed to study just to pass the exam. Japanese people on the whole do not like learning (because of their system).
That is where we see that some "developing countries" are really developping, while Japan in comparison seem to be stagnating, even when some progress is achieved.
You can find more explanations as well as the top 30 and bottom 10 countries for 2005 on
Wikipedia
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