Ep. 41 Tokyo Poverty Women pt.1
Written by Cordelia.
Listen to the full episode :
Hello my dear listeners, nice to see you again here at the little Thursday Night Kissaten. Hope you are doing well.
You know living in North America, I have noticed how the Western World tends to romanticize Japan. People in the West when think of Japan, Tokyo, the first thing that comes to mind is often its glamorous image. Tokyo, one of the richest city in the world. It's a city filled with towering skyscrapers and is a paradise for luxury enthusiasts and Michelin-starred food lovers. Stylish men and women rush through the streets, subways, chasing their dreams. However, in these days, no master where is an issue of poverty. The women in our story today, though living in Tokyo, are far removed from the city's glitzy façade.
Today in this ep, we are going to dive into a non fiction book, Tokyo Poverty Women, to look into the another side of Japan behind the fantasy, part I.
About the Book
Tokyo Poverty Women, was written by Atsuhiko Nakumura, published in April 2019.
Writer Atsuhiko Nakamura, since in his college days, he has been reporting and writing about the social issue of poverty, focusing on adult film starts, sex workers, and care-takers. In 2016, the online magazine Toyo Keizai published a series titled "Women Struggling in Poverty," where Nakamura conducted in-depth interviews with impoverished women in Tokyo. This book, Tokyo Poverty Women, is the result of three years of interviews. The Japanese edition, published in 2019, was shortlisted for the Japan Booksellers’ Award, and the online series gained 1.2 billion views.
Last year November, the real-life tv adoption of the book, Tokyo Poverty Women, I Thought Poverty Was Someone Else's Problem, 東京貧困hinko女子。-貧困なんて他人事だと思ってた- was aired with WOWOW, staring Shuri, and Takahiro Miura, in total six eps.
This book Tokyo Poverty Women, besides acknowledging the rattan root of misogyny in Japanese culture, it also focuses on the systemic reasons behind female poverty. These reasons can be summarized in three points: first, the high cost of university tuition and unmanageable student loans; second, the rise of non-permanent employment; and third, the lack of social security. In the following analysis, we will explore each of these causes in turn, showing how they lead women into poverty. We will use two eps to look into all three causes.
The author has interviewed many women who work in this industry, who are mostly urban poor, and who sell their bodies to pay off debts or solve family issues.Among the interviewees that the author Nakamura interviewed, they are female university students, diligent office workers, and single mothers. Some were born into poverty, while others once lived comfortably but fell into the trap of poverty due to a bad decision, a divorce, or a serious illness, and they’ve never been able to escape.
What is it like to live a life of poverty in the world's richest city? What caused them to fall into poverty? These are the questions that the author, Nakamura, seeks to explore.
This sex industry once provided a way out of poverty, even allowing some to join the middle or wealthy classes. However, since 2006, changes have occurred due to intense competition. Opportunities for adult film actresses have dwindled, the number of films being made has decreased, and with Tokyo’s high rent, only a few top actresses can sustain themselves through this work.
But this trend isn’t limited to the sex industry. The author found that even in the caregiving industry, women are being pushed into poverty. Even with national certification, professional caregivers earn only about 140,000 to 160,000 yen per month (around 7,700 to 8,800 RMB), while the rent for a 30-square-meter apartment in Tokyo can range from 80,000 to 180,000 yen per month.
Most of their income goes toward rent, and more than 70% of caregivers are women.
High Cost of University Tuition Fee
It’s important to note that all the women mentioned in this book use pseudonyms, but their stories are entirely true. Let’s start with the first cause: the high cost of university tuition and unmanageable student loans, and take a look at the plight of female university students in Japan.
The first sentence of the book reads, "University students are really poor."
Over the past 20 years, university tuition in Japan has steadily increased while household incomes have decreased. According to the Ministry of Health, Labour, and Welfare, the average household income in Japan was 6.44 million yen in 1994, but by 2019, this figure had dropped by about 16% to 5.60 million yen.
During this period, tuition at Japan’s national universities increased 4.4 times, from 208,000 yen in 1996 to 535,800 yen today, with private universities charging even more. This means that Japanese parents not only struggle to pay for their children’s tuition, but the amount they can provide for their children’s living expenses is also shrinking.
According to a survey, by 2017, the amount of living expenses Japanese university students received from their parents had dropped from 124,900 yen in 1994 to 82,610 yen. After deducting rent, they had only 817 yen (about 45 RMB) left per day, which is only enough to buy one or two bowls of ramen in Tokyo. As a result, many Japanese university students are plunged into poverty the moment they enter higher education.
They have to balance studying to meet the high standards and strict requirements of university with working part-time jobs to cover expenses. But even with this effort, the money is never enough. Kuryu Ogura, a 21-year-old third-year student at a prestigious private university in Tokyo, is one such example. He came from Kyushu to study in Tokyo, where he has always been an excellent student. However, his annual tuition is 1 million yen, and he needs 2.8 million yen a year to cover tuition, rent, utilities, food, transportation, books, and other expenses, which is already half of the average annual income for a Japanese household.
Ogura’s mother passed away when he was in middle school, and his father, who ran a small business, lost interest in supporting him and his sister after his affair was exposed. With no support from his father, Ogura had to apply for a full scholarship, which provided about 2.2 million yen a year. This could have greatly relieved his financial burden, but his father took 1 million yen for tuition and squandered the remaining 1.2 million yen. Before Ogura came to Tokyo, his father told him, “You’re on your own for living expenses.” Ogura thought he could handle the hardship, but reality hit hard. He quickly found a job as a tutor at a cram school, a high-paying part-time job for university students. However, as cram schools began to cut costs, his hourly wage dropped to 1,600 yen, close to Tokyo’s minimum wage.
Despite his efforts to juggle work and studies, Ogura could only earn 80,000 to 100,000 yen a month, which was not enough to cover his expenses. In the end, he had to take on additional jobs, but he still faced a shortfall of 30,000 to 40,000 yen a month, sometimes having to choose between paying his phone bill or the electricity bill.
One summer, overwhelmed by financial pressure, Ogura found a job as a hostess at a nightclub through a friend. After finishing his work at the cram school, he would rush to the nightclub to entertain male customers until 2 AM. He earned an additional 100,000 yen a month from this job, which, combined with his cram school earnings, barely allowed him to survive in Tokyo.
“I really had no other choice,” he told the author. Although only 21 years old, he looked worn out and depressed. Even if he managed to graduate, Ogura would still face the daunting task of repaying his student loans.
In Japan, so-called “scholarships” are actually student loans. They come in two types: interest-free loans for students with excellent academic performance and significant financial difficulties, and low-interest loans with a current rate of 0.1%, which could rise to 3% once low-interest rates end. Ogura had taken out both types of loans, and upon graduation, he would be saddled with at least 8.8 to 10 million yen in debt.
What does this mean? An anonymous interviewee did the math for the author. Yamada, a 24-year-old graduate of a prestigious university in Tokyo, had to take out a student loan after her father lost his job in high school, and her grandparents barely managed to cover her first year’s tuition. By her fourth year in university, when the school held a repayment briefing for loan recipients, she realized she would owe 6 million yen, while her starting salary at the advertising company she had secured a job with was only about 190,000 yen a month. After taxes, social insurance, and basic living expenses, it would take her until her 40s to pay off the loan.
Many students, like Yamada, were unaware of the consequences of borrowing money. The author points out that in Japan, applying for student loans is easy, and most students from low-income families qualify. Since scholarships are part of the national system, parents and school counselors often recommend them to students planning to go to university. Many of these students are minors, so their parents handle the loan applications. As a result, these young people, who have little understanding of their future careers or the labor market, are burdened with massive debt.
Yet the repayment terms are strict. For example, if payments are missed for three months, the student is placed on a credit blacklist and hounded by collection agencies.
Facing sudden and overwhelming debt, many students spiral into confusion, and some, under immense pressure, turn to high-paying part-time jobs, eventually entering the sex industry. The author found that many women in Tokyo, including students from prestigious universities like Waseda, Keio, and Sophia, turned to the sex industry to pay off their debts.
Since 2018, it has also become common for young men to seek older women as “sponsors.” Yamada, who worked in a sex shop during her university years, decided to reject the advertising job she was offered after graduation and became a porn actress. Due to her looks and figure, she was popular among male audiences, and her films sold well, earning her more than a typical office worker. However, the stress, anxiety, and uncertainty eventually destroyed her mental health. She quit the porn industry but struggled to find stable work, eventually developing alcoholism and spending time in a psychiatric hospital.
When the author interviewed her, Yamada looked exhausted and worn out, her face marked by the hardships she had endured, making it hard to believe she was a 24-year-old recent graduate. Ogura, who was only 21, had already lost hope in life.
When the author asked her, “What do you see for yourself in 10 years?” Ogura replied, “I think I’ll have committed suicide by then. I can’t even imagine myself alive, let alone happy.”
The high cost of university tuition and the burden of student loans are the first reasons why many young women fall into poverty. They are already in debt before they graduate, and when they leave school, they face a labor market that increasingly relies on non-permanent employment. This rise in non-permanent employment is the second reason women fall into poverty.
Ending
As we wrap up today's episode, it's important to recognize that the stories we've explored reveal the stark realities many women in Tokyo face. The high cost of education, the trap of student loans, and the instability of non-permanent employment create a cycle that is difficult to escape. What may seem like distant issues in a foreign land actually reflect larger global trends that many can relate to, regardless of where they live.
Next week, we’ll dive into the second cause behind female poverty in Tokyo: the rise of non-permanent employment. We’ll explore how these unstable job conditions disproportionately affect women and what that means for their futures in one of the world’s richest cities.
Thank you for joining me on this deep dive into Tokyo Poverty Women. If this episode has resonated with you, please share it with others who might also find it thought-provoking. Remember, these issues aren’t just about Tokyo—they reflect broader, systemic challenges that many face around the world.
Take care, and I’ll see you next time at the little Thursday Night Kissaten.
Reference
Welcome back to Thursday Night Kissaten podcast.
In this episode, we are going to talk about a nonfiction book, Tokyo Poverty Women, 東京貧困女子: : 彼女たちはなぜ躓いたのか by Atsuhiko Nakamura (中村淳彦)
Writer/Host/Technician/Translator: Cordelia
Work: 東京貧困女子: 彼女たちはなぜ躓いたのか (Tokyo Poverty Women)
Author: 中村淳彦 (Atsuhiko Nakamura)
TV Show website in Japanese: https://www.wowow.co.jp/drama/original/hinkon/
Book in Japanese: https://amzn.asia/d/f8Tf9s8
Background music:
フリーBGM「夜明けはすぐそこに」by のる
https://dova-s.jp/bgm/play20306.html
