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Comment by adev_ | Hacker News Reader

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.

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> Considering our pension schemes will become also at risk, we might encounter exactly the same situation in some decades.

Canada here. The maximum possible CPP (Canada Pension Plan) monthly payout is half the average rent for a 2 bedroom apartment across the country.

It's funny, 20 years ago we were talking about boomers not having saved enough for retirement and worries around that... Now real estate has inflated so much that boomers are the wealthiest cohort and most retire by selling real estate then downsizing or renting...

>Canada here. The maximum possible CPP (Canada Pension Plan) monthly payout is half the average rent for a 2 bedroom apartment across the country.

1. For cities or rural areas? If you're retired you don't really need to live close to a city center for a job. That'll reduce costs significantly.

2. Why would a retired person need 2 bedrooms?

> Why would a retired person need 2 bedrooms?

To receive visiting relatives for a couple days. Also when they get sick or break a bone, and need 24/7 assistance for a couple weeks/months, having a second bedroom available is very helpful.

1. Country wide. In Toronto or Vancouver it's more like 3-4x.

2. Because 2 bedrooms are the most common type of unit so realistically that's the actual "average rent". Statistics that use single bedroom units are garbage because so few units exist.

The elderly probably need to live close(r) to healthcare facilities. The vast majority of chronic disease burden is concentrated into the last 10 years of life or so. Living in a rural area with few doctors in proximity means realistic risk of undetected cancer, or having a heart attack too far from an ICU etc., thus dying perhaps a decade earlier.

Property prices are going to crash hard in Canada. The government plans on capping temporary residents at 5% of the population, down from a current 7.5%. That means that 900,000 people are going to have to leave. And that's the Liberal plan. The presumptive incoming Conservative plan is going to cap numbers even harder.

Combine that with a massive recession caused by the Trump tariffs, and expect property prices and rents to plummet.

Rents are already down to a 17 month low, but that's just a minor correction compared to what's coming.

> Now real estate has inflated so much that boomers are the wealthiest cohort [...]

That currently should also serve as a lesson for Western governments.

Real Estate price in Japan have been decreasing for decades almost everywhere excepted Tokyo.

The reason are multiple but the main one is also the declining population: Why would you pay more when there is so many empty houses ?

That removed any hope for many elderlies to capitalize on their properties for their retirement.

> That removed any hope for many elderlies to capitalize on their properties for their retirement.

Canada is absolutely not the model to follow. The absurd housing market means that actual, productive economic activity isn't happening. In the last decade we've fallen behind many of our peers in standard of living and average income.

They will die natural deaths much earlier and peacefully without all kinds of mental/physical decline if beyond retirement age, they just stop taking any medication.

Especially if they have no plan to do anything other than prolong their own lives for no reason.

I can understand seniors who are active and have something going on in their lives. But if you spend time around hospitals/pharmacies the number of seniors who have nothing going on other than making hospital/pharmacy visits is ridiculous. Its like they are kept alive cause docs and pharma companies can keep them alive. Not for any other reason.

Yes, antibiotics might be cheap but the cost is enormous.

> But if you spend time around hospitals/pharmacies the number of seniors who have nothing going on other than making hospital/pharmacy visits is ridiculous.

Who are you to say this, genuinely? If a person wants to refuse treatment, they are able to even if it would be fatal to them. If a person feels their life is still worth living, who are you to judge that and advocate for making the choice for them? I only bristle because this is also the logic to assume people who are severely disabled are better off dead without ever consulting them (a fact constantly fought against by severely disabled advocates like Alice Wong).

I agree but there is also a pretty large subset of that elderly population that is like "I want to die. Please let me die" and then the nurse is like "ok sure Alice now take your pills"

You don’t have to have “something going on” for your life to be worth living or have value

> the number of seniors who have nothing going on other than making hospital/pharmacy visits is ridiculous

As someone who is part way down this slope, let me tell you: it's not like you're fine, you're fine, you're fine...BOOM! you spend your life going to the doctor. Instead, it starts with "I go to the doctor every few years because I remember to," to "I have this one thing that requires me to check in annually," to "I have to double-check the pills I'm taking in the morning to make sure I'm taking all the right ones," to "It seems like I always have 1-3 doctor appointments pending," to, I'm assuming, what you're describing.

That makes it harder to pick the point where you should step onto the ice floe and wave good-bye to your family.

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