Japan's elderly are lonely and struggling. Some women choose to go to jail

It is shocking that ANY women are doing this, that's why. There has long been some small number of men, usually homeless ones, willing to commit crimes to go to jail. It's one of the downsides of having humane jails, I suppose.

At scale (large population) doing any job to 100% is hard, even in Japan.

Informally, Asian cultures lean on family a lot more for generational support than Anglo cultures, but when you have less/no children it's pretty harsh.

Pensions in Japan are divided in two systems: public and private. Which one you have depend of your job type.

Public pensions are extremely low (~5600$/year). They are more a "survival minimal amount" for the elderly than a real retirement pension.

There is also a phenomenon of pride among the elderlies in Japan: It is almost unthinkable for them to ask money to their children (At the opposite, doing so is pretty common in China or Korea).

Considering this context and life conditions, it is no surprise that some elderly with the lowest pensions choose to turn into crime to try to overcome their situation.

Their is a lesson the west should take here: Western countries birthrate follows the direction of Japan ones. Considering our pension schemes will become also at risk, we might encounter exactly the same situation in some decades.

Historically, and in theory, Japanese culture did and does value the elderly highly.

In practical reality...especially in sustained poor economic times, with the "normal" shape of the population pyramid long gone, many families fall short of that ideal.

The nice prison is funded by the government. Think of it as a social welfare program with an innovative barrier to those who do not truly need the help.

Japan has a pretty cold family culture compared to other nearby countries like China and Korea. They show respect for the eldery and the elderly have pride but they have broken down a lot of the multigenerational family dynamics that used to exist similarly to their neighbours. Showing respect when talking to elders is different to being close to them and really caring for them. There is also just such an extreme aging population that there is no way to care for all of them.

> At least in the US, people will say they support the death penalty for violent crimes because they don't want to pay for that criminal to live off tax dollars in a prison. But, they won't do simple research to understand the cost of executing someone far outpaces the cost to keep them in prison for life.

The contradiction is only in your head. The people who think that also probably think that executing someone shouldn’t cost that much. Bullets are cheap, it is all the appeals which costs money. For many with that opinion if they had their way someone would get convicted, sentenced and then executed in less than a day. Some might want more procedural safeguards. Like an appeal in a month and then execution a day after that. Still massively cheaper than keeping someone locked up for the rest of their lives.

These might be inhumane and monstrous wishes, but they have internal consistency. It is not like the cost of executing someone is constrained by the rules of physics.

"But, they won't do simple research to understand the cost of executing someone far outpaces the cost to keep them in prison for life."

High costs of capital penalty are a deliberate choice. There is nothing intrinsic about executions that makes them expensive. Keeping that person behind the bars for decades while all sorts of appeals are pending is the expensive part.

The British abolished their death penalty in 1965. Prior to that, the norm was "three clear Sundays" from the trial (later, from one short appeal) to the execution. Of all the arguments against the death penalty in Old Blighty, cost just didn't play a role. It wasn't costly to hold someone in the condemned cell for a month, then hang them using a two-member team (usually Pierrepoint and his assistant).

How would the cost of an elder-care facility compare to the cost of an extremely low-security prison for the elderly? (Not saying that the facility they describe qualifies as such.)

If prisons serve the purpose, attract only the truly needy, and require none of the painful political discussions that setting up a huge system of eldercare facilities would require...

I don’t think wealthier people will choose to live where less wealthier people live. As is, they filter to different neighborhoods with periods of gradation separating them. In a tower, you still have to go to the ground floor to leave.

Also, sounds like Dredd

Is that true for elderly non-violent men confined in Japan? I thought solitary confinement was mostly a US barbarity. Does Japan use it as frequently?

The women discussed in the article had compulsory work. That's probably part of the appeal, it's good to stay busy and feel useful.