News for hackers. Stuff that matters.

A comment on The rise of the pointless job. Parent comment

Re:The rise of the pointless job by api on Friday May 04, 2018 @01:54PM (#16996658)
That's really interesting. I've drawn another more superficial Japan comparison: Japanese economic stagnation since the 1980s. I've been predicting for a while that we are headed for "planet Japan": perpetually low interest rates and not much actual growth.

What ended the era you describe? Contact with the outside world? I've also thought for a long time that space migration is the only real hope for the human race to avoid permanent stagnation and eventual decline.

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:The rise of the pointless job by pesmhey on Friday May 04, 2018 @03:28PM (#16997492)
The Meiji Restoration. It was somewhat of a result of the Japanese being contacted by the outside world and realizing that they were behind.

Also the "floating world" period up to that point, so it seems like life was at least decent for people before the outside influence.

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:The rise of the pointless job by rangibaby on Saturday May 05, 2018 @09:18AM (#17001679)
> Contact with the outside world?

Perry (US) sailed a fleet into Tokyo Bay and threatened to destroy the city if the samurai government didn’t open trade with the US (1850s).

Fearing domination by western powers (cf. China) the Japanese reformed their society and economy based on western empires (1868) and within 40 years was able to soundly defeat Russia in a war (1905).

[ Parent | on HN ]