Looks like Japanese people worked significantly more hours than Americans in the 80s and 90s, the gap narrowed in the 00s, and the U.S. just (barely) passed Japan starting in 2015. I could be outdated in my understanding of Japanese work culture.
Japanese people seem to stay in the workforce a few years longer, but given the older population, I'm not sure how to weight this.
Somehow that part of the world seems to have avoided this phenomenon. Maybe because it was a big political/external change (the collapse of the soviet union), so people found it easier to cope with it.
Some people are able to survive, while others get crushed and give up.
> certain corporate environments
it happens, both in terms of company, and situation (e.g. crunch weeks), but that ain't the entire country all the time the way it is in Japan.
I recall a study about how the average workday in Japan was peaking at 13 hours, and the corporate execs were worrying that it was starting to trend down. Similar approaches like 996 are a thing in China, too.