> These Gengō updates force a massive, MASSIVE number of date entry forms (both paper and digital) -- from banks to government offices to driver's licenses to middle school soccer club application forms to just literally ANYTHING else imaginable -- to update to new versions including the new era name, resulting in so much wasted resources and taxpayer money every time it happens.

The early Babylonian system was to give each year its own name. This has really helped us, thousands of years later, to develop an accurate chronology of the period.

If Japan used that system today, do you think the per-switch cost of switching would be higher or lower? How about the per-emperor cost?