The World’s Factory’s Dilemma

It would be unquestionable that China is the Workshop of the world if it was a few years ago. But now, this is a controversial thesis, comparing the current influence of the economy in international supply chains with other fast-growing countries. The more China grows in its economic size and variety of jobs, working as the world’s factory, the more companies and countries withdraw the capital and business from China. Though Apple’s assembly line of computers and mobile devices used to be based on Chinese factories, the firm is bringing a part of production back to the U.S. from the country. Even the domestic companies have decisions to offshore production from China to other emerging economies like India, South East Asian and African countries. How is China losing its superiority as the world’s factory, and what economic rolls is it expected to play in the next stage of development?

No more cheap labor

Although labor was so cheap and plentiful that few other countries could match it, the workforce is shrinking especially in simple labor such as assembly lines of electronic devices. This is mainly due to ageing population of the country thanks to the government’s one-child policy, but more significantly, the wider range of job opportunity as a result of economic growth gave factory workers less incentive to stay in the exhausting part of the assembly line for the conventional level of salary. As the wage rises, company executives started to re-shore production from China to their home country or relocate manufacturing plants to other developing countries. It is almost common sense that China is out of choice  when outsourcing production. 

Insufficient investment in R&D

If China has something to blamed for the current slowdown in the economic growth, though the economy still expanding by 7.8% in the third quarter this year, it might be that the country failed to develop infrastructure for R&D. The track record or financial networks to support the sort of speculative research is indispensable for innovation. However, few Chinese companies have established these foundation of R&D, just scaling up their business size with profits by copying foreign products. This caused the country to build its industry upon existing technology and never let it leave from the low-price-and-good-quality standard, even that is being outdated in the recent inflating labor cost.

Scarce manager-class human resources

As the business scale in China expands, the country faces difficulty in finding talent to fulfils the needs for entrepreneurs and executives. There are few qualified human resources who can command a large enterprise and even who operate an office or store as a middle manager. The scarcity of manager-class workers is partly because China’s higher education system is still in the process of development, yet the country’s history of growth in which it’s own corporate governance has not been formed, relying too much on FDIs and foreign company’s capital control, is more in charge.

Conclusions

China is now standing at a turning point where one leads back to the Workshop of the world with no more advantage of cheap and plentiful labor, and another to a different type  of economy that leads the world industry by creation and innovation. If China chooses the second one, it has to come through at least three challenges; labours with productivity that is globally competitive in terms of cost effectiveness not of cheapness; investment into infrastructure of R&D that enables companies to create tools for creation; and completion of higher education to meet the demand for managers in the economy. In addition, it is also important to arrange regulatory environment to better protect intellectual property so that each player in the economy recognises costs for copying, otherwise no one tries hard to create anything. 

*Michael Schuman, “China Makes Everything. Why Can’t It Create Anything?,” TIME, Nov 11 issue, 2013.  

What Should Every College Graduate Know?

While the Obama Administration tries to introduce the rating system for qualification over the university graduates, Japan’s education rebuilding council considers to replace hand-writing entrance exams with interviews to “appreciate high school students’ diversity.” The difference in how each country approaches to measuring the core value of the university suggests that Japan’s society is still unclear about the significance of the higher education, because passing through the world’s most difficult level entrance exams is supposed to guarantee the quality of students, which is nothing related to what they learn while in universities, and now even that qualification the council is going to turn off. A meaningful guide to re-define the value of higher education in Japan is provided by the problem that America’s colleges and universities confront: What should every college graduate know?

General knowledge acquired in core curriculum

One says what every college student have to acquire through higher education is general knowledge in a wide range of subjects; in other wards, there are certain books one should read and certain facts one should know to be considered a truly educated person. By reading classic texts and discussing them in the context of enduring issues in human society, such as individuality, capitalism, and governance, every student is compelled to engage with ideas that forms the mainstream of the society and more importantly gets ready for being a part of it. These knowledges might not be directly utilised in alumni’s profession and benefit practically his/her life in any circumstances; however, it would be difficult for graduates to adopt themselves into the society without knowing the basis of what they are going to belong.

More specialised knowledge that students are free to choose

On the other hand, many academics prefer to teach more specialised courses and allow students more freedom to set their own curriculums. The prevailing academic culture puts more emphasis on developing a students’s ability in a certain academic field to confront questions and find answers to them: how to think, how to express, how to handle data, and how to conduct a experiment. These technical skills and specialised knowledge enable graduates to make money immediately and instantly. Moreover, the freedom to choose one’s academic path will keep a student’s motivation in learning and pursuing his/her own specialty along with the interest. 

Speciality is not enough 

Today’s academic administration, whether in the U.S. or somewhere else, is in a great anxiety among key constituencies—parents, alumni and employers, and pushed along with their requests towards more pragmatic and instant education focusing on specialty and qualification. Students deserve to make up their own curriculum, taking risk in selecting how they build intellectual foundation, which may not be the one society (or employers) expect them, as some graduate surveys in the U.S. find out a considerable portion of students leave the school without basic knowledge about society and raise concerns widely among education and economic authorities*. This is the pitfall that the current academic trend involves and therefore why colleges and universities are responsible for providing with common core subjects in which students are compelled to learn indispensable knowledge in the society.

*The Class of 2025, Jon Meacham, TIME issued October 7, 2013.

Not Having Children Is Chosen or Supposed?

Not Having Children Is Chosen or Supposed? 

Kiyotaka ISHIKAWA

Recently, I have celebrated my female classmate in the university for her marriage in her 25 and suddenly realized that I am also in a marriageable age. The next lifetime event supposed to take place in her life is childbirth while the country’s birthrate has been at the historically lowest level under 1.4 and not supposed to be improved for the time being. As women’s lifestyle diversified, more and more women choose childless lives especially those highly educated like the friend of mine. On the other hand, the rising economic cost of raising a child and unemployment among the young in a down economy build up structural barriers that keep women who want to have a child from putting it into practice. Is today’s fertility crash because she chose it or was supposed to do so, and why is that? 

Motherhood is not an option for every woman

It is almost a consensus over developed countries that women tend to have fewer number of children, and some choose not to have one, as the economy grows, and this is often seen as a result of the inflation of the cost for raising a child. According to the statistic of the Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare of Japan, an average cost of raising a first child is approximately 13 million yen, which decreases to 10 million and 7.7 million for the second and third child respectively. If you plan to send your child to a private school in the entire education, the figure will be doubled or even tripled. Although affordability is not the only necessary condition to have a child, this is enough for many women of childbearing age to be discouraged to give a birth to a child. Especially for those who have to work even after childbirth due to economic reasons, it would be a tough choice to take care of children while having a job for the family and the fund of the future education.  

Motherhood is not an obligation but an option

These spendings on a child are bearable for highly-educated women with an expectation of good salary like my university classmate; however, the leading population of childless women consists of women like her. The proportion of women expecting to remain childless is greater among those with high income; when American women grouped into three income range, 1 in 8 women among the top income class is childless while 1 in 14 with middle income and 1 in 20 with low income. This is because higher education often leads to higher opportunity costs of giving up the career, which average value is worth as high as $1 million in lost salary, lost promotion and so on. Furthermore, women who are successful in the business and the private without a child have less incentives to have one because they feel advantageous about being free from all sorts of troubles that come with children. 

The dual structure of the low birthrate affair

Even if so, those rich and childless women will hardly answer to such a question, “Who is going to take care of you when you’re old and lonely?” The conventional measures to increase birthrate have focused mainly on women with a will to give a birth and a financial problem, but career women who have rare opportunity to have a child are also very good potential mothers, because they are more or less interested in having their own children. Therefore, the social affair of low fertility rate needs to be re-considered from two points of view: not only the poor but also the rich require supports for motherhood.

*The Child-Free Life, Lauren Sandler, TIME issued September 16, 2013, pp.34-41

Japan’s Not-Quite-So-Nationalist Leaders

Japan’s Not-Quite-So-Nationalist Leaders

-The Nazi comments by Japan’s Finance Minister is misled or intended?-

Kiyotaka ISHIKAWA

Japan’s deputy prime minister Taro Aso is quite famous for his usual off-the-cuff remarks in the past, and here is the latest gaffe at the study meeting about the Constitution revision in the final week July. He said that: “The German Weimar constitution changed, without being noted, to the nazi German constitution. Why don’t we learn from their tactics?” No matter what intension behind his speech, the statement proves how deeply he is interested in revising the constitution which is the most sensitive topic for both the domestics and the neighbors. Nevertheless, Aso’s political ideals may sound rather reasonable, surrounded by emerging Chinese military in East Asia and recent territorial disputes with China and Korea. 

Is he a true nationalist who even tries Nazi’s tactics into practice, or a right-wing politician with good reasons to have such a political goal?

What is his thoughts behind the Nazi comments?

Facing criticisms over the Nazi comments, Aso retracted his statement and excuse himself by saying that he meant it as a bad example of changes made without a substantial debate or understanding among citizens. Actually, earlier in the same talk, he had criticized the Nazis for repealing the Weimar Constitution, which he praised as the most progressive in Europe at the time. 

However, he also advocates revising Japan’s pacifist constitution as the Liberal Democrats had held quiet and extensive discussions about its proposals. In another speech, he blamed older Japanese, who historically respect the current constitution, especially Article 9 of which forbids Japan from having a standing army, for the lack of support in the discussion over the revision. Therefore, he possibly admires how smoothly and stealthily the Nazi party changed Germany’s pre-World War Ⅱ constitution, because even attempts to change would raise protests among Japan’s elder citizens who are also the major supporter for the LDP. 

Yet, either case is still unclear about what Aso really meant, so it would be helpful to refer to recent political contexts over his comment as follows. 

The rightist political goal that Abe administration hold

The argument over the constitution is undoubtedly rooted in changing geopolitics of East Asia mainly due to the emergence of China. The scene of a dangerous standoff with the country over the Senkaku Islands, which are so far controlled by Japanese, has been a usual diplomatic problem since Aso had led his own administration in 2008 and 2009. Even if not cause a violent confrontation, this issue reminds the bottleneck in Japan’s constitution which restricts its self defense forces to do any military action until they themselves were shot at. 

This provides Japan’s foreign policy with a very good reason to shape nationalist agenda with popular prime minister’s political rhetoric. In fact, when Abe took office after the campaign that featured talk on territorial disputes and defense, he promised to revise the pacifist constitution, loosen restrictions on Japan’s armed forces and post government personnel on the islands claimed by China. His political goals and ideals basically remains nationalistic since he took office for the first time in 2006 and so does Aso’s, as he has been placed at the executive post in Abe administration. 

Moving rightwards to even reach the middle

Although revising the constitution is Aso’s (and also Abe’s) political appealing point and his motivation behind the Nazi comment, he seems unlikely to realize it at any cost. As foreign minister mentions, improved ties with China are a high priority of the government, which is practiced in diplomacy-conscious manners by Aso and Abe. Aso suggested that Japanese politicians should make visit Tokyo’s Yasukuni war shrine quietly to avoid controversy. Moreover, Abe made China his first overseas visit to strengthen relations and avoided Yasukuni while in office. 

From these above, Abe and members of his government including Aso, who have spoken of restoring Japan’s pride over foreign affairs, can hold the politically successful moderate line without drawing unnecessary tensions from neighbors by pushing for any extremely rightist changes, except this time’s careless Nazi comments. It depends on individuals to regard this as whether the lack of diplomatic ability or just another episode of his sense of humor, but at least he is nothing like Nazi’s extreme nationalist.

References

Japan Deputy PM Taro Aso retracts Nazi comments, BBC News, August 1, 2013,

retrieved from http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-23527300

Japan’s Finance Minister Retracts Statement on Nazis, Martin Fackler, NY Times.com, August 1 2013, 

retrieved from http://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/02/world/asia/japans-finance-minister-retracts-statement-on-nazis.html?_r=3&

Japan’s Aso Refuses to Resign Over nazi Comment, Elaine Kurtenbach and Mari Yamaguchi, AP, August 2, 2013, 

retrieved from http://world.time.com/2013/08/02/japans-aso-refuses-to-resign-over-nazi-comment/

The Identity Crisis That Lurks Behind Japan’s Right-Wing Rhetoric, Roland Kelts, TIME, May 31, 2013, 

retrieved from http://world.time.com/2013/05/31/the-identity-crisis-that-lurks-behind-japans-right-wing-rhetoric/

Japan’s Not-Quite-So-Nationalist Leader, Kirk Spitzer, TIME, January 3, 2013, 

retrieved from http://nation.time.com/2013/01/03/japans-not-quite-so-nationalist-leader/

Should She Lean In or Pull Back?

Should She Lean In or Pull Back? 

-Facebook’s Sheryl Sandberg on a mission to reboot feminism-

Kiyotaka ISHIKAWA

Sheryl Sandberg, leading Facebook with its famous CEO, draws the world’s attention not as the company’s COO but as a woman, wife, and mother. Her first book, Lean In, is still on the bestseller list since published in the U.S. early this year. This raises a question: why are we still arguing about women and success although gender equality in business has been advocated for a few decades? Probably, it is due to the absence of a role model who plays a successful woman both in business and home as we know few female leaders in companies, even fewer of them successful as a partner and working parents. Sandberg is taking that place and refueling feminism. Why does she try to empower business women for success, and is it worth trying?

Why women need to lean in

Statistics show tiny presence of women in executive positions. The percentage of female CEOs at Fortune 500 companies is 4.2 % in 2013, slightly improved from 1.4% in 2003, while women make up almost half the workforce and even exceed men in the rate of holding college degree over the 25-34 age group. When Sandberg refers to what or who is keeping women down from success in business, she puts emphasis on the invisible barrier in women’s minds. Females are raised from birth to have different expectations such as “Don’t be outspoken, aggressive, more powerful than men.” Women internalize these negative messages they get throughout their lives to result in wrecking women’s ability to advance into senior positions. 

How to lean in

Sandberg’s argument in the book is that how to get rid of these internal barriers is critical to gaining power. Most importantly among all tips she shows, we, both men and women, need to be aware of the penalty women pay for success. An experiment suggests that success and likability are positively correlated for men and negatively for women. The examinee students were assigned to read a female successful entrepreneur’s story. Half of them read the original one while the other half read the same story with just a difference—her name was changed to a man’s. As a result, the latter group with the alternation of her name came across as a more appealing colleague. On the other hand, she was seen as selfish and not the type of person the subjects would want to hire or work with.  

By showing both men and women how female colleagues are held to different standards, we can start changing attitudes today. Sandberg is one of such women who have been be said “too aggressive,” “not a term player,” or “a bit political” even in the current manners of gender equality. Sometimes, a manager like her at companies receives feedback that a woman who reported by her colleagues is “too aggressive,” but she asks the people who gave the feedback, “If a man had done those same things, would you have considered him too aggressive?” They always says no. She continues “we have to both fight against the barriers and get them out of our consciousness.”

Leaning in is not the option for all?

Sandberg’s argument is based on her ideal of true equality where women ran half of our countries and companies and men ran half of our home. Do women who she is trying to empower really want that kind power, even if female accomplishment comes at a cost? A lot of working women today might feel happy to lean back from their ambition to play a limited role that has been systematically told they were supposed to do, considering what they have to lose when their colleagues realized their success. It is a highly personal decision so no one should pass judgement on this. However, there’s an ambition gap between men and women because a woman is less likely to have an environment where she can pursuit her ambition than a man is, not because women genetically tend to be not as ambitions as men. Sandberg is just trying to see where boys and girls end up if they get equal encouragement, and she is sure about that we might have some differences in how leadership is done but no difference in its quality. 

Comments

A woman does not necessarily need to be as aggressive as a man at her leading position in companies, but, instead, she would be required to have irreplaceable qualities in order to compete with male rivals, just as Sandberg does. The CEO Zuckerberg admits her unique abilities as the only female top executive in Facebook, especially her high emotional quotient (EQ) as well as efficiency. In a meeting to discuss the purchase of a Web-design company, Sandberg reminded her team that the firm’s founder was about to have a birthday and wanted to get the deal done before the big day. That consideration turned out to be very effective in the company acquisition.

Her episodes support that women can lead companies quite successfully but in different way male leaders do. According to data from McKinsey’s company survey, businesses with more women on their boards are more profitable. It is a benefit of companies for women to come over the internal barriers in their mind, and, of course, it is also the true accomplishment of their ambitions, offsetting what they have to pay for the success and even paying off. So, it’s worth trying. 

*Belinda Luscombe, Confidence Woman, TIME, March 18 issue, 2013, pp.22-31.

**Sheryl Sandberg, Lean In: Women, Work and the Will to Lead, Knopf, 2013.

THE CONFLICT OF THE BILINGUAL MIND

THE CONFLICT OF THE BILINGUAL MIND

The multilingual education raises children nimbler but too language-oriented?

Kiyotaka ISHIKAWA

As the world more globalized, we have a lot of situation in schools, business, and daily lives that requires more than one language. One of the most effective way to learn a multilingual skill is to start early, precisely during a pre-school period when an ability to acquire languages peaks at 9 months and sharply drop off at 6 years. Mastery of multiple languages in this period, according to a study, unexpectedly affects neurological structure of growing brains, which means bilingual children grow nimbler. However, some mothers with a half-blood child concern the brain specialized in multilingual skills might miss his chances to have interest in non-lingual subjects. Does putting children in a multilingual environment necessarily do better than a monolingual education does?

Learning a second language can produce a nimbler mind

A physiological experiment last year in Sweden proved there is detectable growth in the nerve system among a group of children mastering an unfamiliar language as compared to a controlled group studying non-lingual subjects. Most changes were observed in the cognitive areas of the brain, for example, in the hippocampus which governs memory, and in the cerebral cortex, where higher-order reasoning is proceeded. 

This is coherent with a result of the empirical experiment, known as the Stroop test, in which subjects are flashed the names of colors on a screen, with the word matching or mismatching the actual colors of the letters, and are told to say the color’s name. The point  of the test is to examine simultaneous recognition of the color and the letter in the case of mismatch; announcing only the color while ignoring what the word says. At the trial, almost all bilingual subjects are faster and make fewer mistakes than monolinguals. 

These consequences indicate the bilinguals retain a higher cognitive ability and do better at handling multiple tasks simultaneously. A research psychologist attributes the bilinguals’ superiority over the cognitive test to the fewer loss of efficiency when they rotate among tasks, called the global switch cost in psychology. She says, “Everyone slows down some or makes more errors, but multilinguals have less of the drop-off.”

Bilingual education may fail to establish profession

Although it is surely advantageous over monolinguals for children to speak more than one language and even have a smarter brain among classmates and colleagues, they have to give up something everyone has in order to gain what the others do not have. There are time and interest limits over human’s intellectual development, so devoting one’s time and interest mainly to language mastery means missing a chance to learn something else.

An essay writer Sandra Haefelin, a half Germany and half Japanese, analyzes people with mixed blood of Germany and Japanese, comparing those who speak only Germany to those proficient at the both languages, and empirically concludes the German speakers are more likely to be engaged in a highly-specialized job like a doctor, lawyer, or engineer. Contrarily, the bilinguals tend to show a deep interest in language and culture and result in starting their career as a interpreter or translator.

Therefore, multilingual education may possibly spoil a child’s aptitude for non-lingual fields such as science, music, or sports. In other words, once a bilingual brain is developed at expense of time and interest in childhood, he might live the rest of life without begin aware of his talent even if he was a born mathematician, being afraid of wasting those resources already spent.

Conclusions

On the one hand, the neuroscientific evidence proves multilingual training at the primary stage of education enhances a child’s ability to process a few tasks simultaneously at faster pace and greater accuracy than monolinguals do. On the other hand, his inborn capability over non-lingual subjects could be prevented from expression by forcing him to concentrate his attention on language mastery. 

This issue is about a typical dilemma every person involved in education concerns about, that is, do they train a child’s brain so that he gains intellectual advantage at the early stage of life, or do they try not to interfere a child’s interest so as to improve his ability along his aptitude? 

From my case of primary education, I respect how my parents provided me with a variety of opportunity to find out my aptitude by myself. They sent me swimming, gymnastics, piano, and Japanese calligraphy school, and took me a number of foreign countries when summer vacations came, but never forced me after entering the high school. So, I believe I could have established my own core values and trained myself to develop ability for my career, and I would do the same thing as my parents did, for my future child. 

*kluger, Jeferey, “The Power of the Bilingual Brain,” TIME, pp.32-37, July 29, 2013

**Haefelin, Sandra, “The Pitfalls of the Bilingual,” retrieved from http://young-germany.jp/article_315

Japan’s Recruiting is Really Outdated?

Japan’s Recruiting is Really Outdated?

The comparison of Japan’s recruiting custom to the global practice

Kiyotaka ISHIKAWA

“Once you miss the chance, you are a loser for the rest of your life.” This is a usual saying when Japan’s recruitment system goes into a controversy. Same as the global practice of recruitment, Japan’s students have to find their job during their final year of the university,  however, different from the global practice, otherwise they will have much less opportunity to be a regular employee. This point of criticism is quite reasonable, but it does not, by any means, justify blindly admiring of the American recruitment practice. This article* provides with a fair discussion over Japan’s recruitment custom, suggesting a few liable misleading of American job offering, and focusing on rational aspects in Japan’s recruitment.

Generally accepted criticisms on periodic recruiting of new graduates

It is a problem that the current recruitment system is too stressful for students; however, is that really good reason for promoting the social mobility of employment and the diversity of career? A typical suggestion persuades major companies to change the current practice, saying that “Look at the American, we can manage human resources more rationally if we make use of graduated students and mid-career workers.” Another says “Look at the American, we can create innovative products and services like Apple and Google if we hire various people with various careers.” IS THAT REALLY SO?

America’s recruiting is not that good as the Japanese think

For the first point of the issue, the social mobility of employment, it is exact that American major companies advertise for young employees regardless of the graduation year nor season, that is called the entry level employment. However, this type of job offer requires business experiences in the corresponding categories, so most American students have to start their career as an associate staff or trainee for a small salary. Those workers who get the first job in that way, unlike the regular employee post in Japan, do not expect promotions and pay raises.

Secondly, the diversity of career is also misleading context of employment in the United States. Yes, the American workers change their job more frequently than the Japanese do, yet they hardly change their specialty. Once they have apprenticeship in a certain job category, it is difficult to change the course whether the job is suited for them or not, because they have to fight for a position among well-experienced mid-career people. As a result, the American employees in big companies are even more standardized than the Japanese. Thinking about Macintosh and Google’s search engine, none of these were born in a big company but in a garage.

Re-evaluating the rational aspects of Japan’s old-fashioned recruitment 

As often pointed out, Japan’s recruitment system is based on the periodic employment of inexperienced students, which might sound irrational competition for the homogeneous working environment. Even if so, putting newcomers with similar inexperience into training reduces the education costs. On the other hand, there is a disadvantage in the American system that employing workers along with their own specialty means they only have to do their job and have no prospect to promote into a higher position.

The sense of loyalty in most of Japanese companies raises discussion over the negative aspect of remaining in a single company for life; for example, such an attitude toward the company prevents employees from establishing their specialty. Nevertheless, that form of service works well in the way that employees can find the most suited kind of job in the company by going through a variety of types of job. Moreover, the personnel changes within the company can be responsible to unexpected cases over human relations at a minimum cost, for instance, a worker having trouble with his boss. 

Conclusions

In summary, the American practice of recruitment are not necessarily a good medicine for the syndrome of Japan’s corporate structure in the labor market because adopting the very way of the U.S. cause also a few of side effects. Neither way of Japan nor America can save students entering to business from hardship in job hunting; switching to the specialty-based employment in turn deepens standardization of human resources in the context of major companies. 

Contrarily, the Japanese custom of recruitment is re-discovered to have a number of good characters worth evaluating in terms of business rationality. As long as young workers are adopted and remain in the closed corporate structure, personnel affairs are quite rationally optimized in newcomer education and human resource allocation. 

*Ebihara, T. (2009), Koyou no Joushiki (The Sense of Recruitment), p.183-200, Chikuma Publishing.

Flatland

Flatland

-Should the virtual world try to look like the real one?-

Kiyotaka ISHIKAWA

A trash can on your computer screen. You know what it is for, but should it be like a real-world trash can? Today’s software design world have questioned itself about this, and finally turned out to be against any kind of mimic or skeuomorphical design, as Apple’s iOS7 unveiled with its entirely abstract and flat interface. The term skeuomorph actually refers to an element in an object’s design that is no longer functionally necessary but has been retained anyway for ornamental purposes. However, skeuomorphism have played a significant role in the realm of software design for functional purposes. What function was it, and why is it no longer necessary?

What skeuomorphism have done in software design?

When we face a new technology like a smartphone, its interface does not have to look like a real world stuffs, but it does because it works well in the way we instantly know what it is for. For example, in 1984, Apple introduced the original Mackintosh with a digital rendering of a desktop, where windows, documents, folders, and a trash can were skeuomorphically designed to mimic the real physical work environment we were used to. 

Although skeuomorphical design has made unfamiliar digital environment feel safe and easy at at the very early ages of personal computers, there is a powerful sentiment against it among most software designers. It was Apple that introduced skeuomorphical design successfully on personal computers for the first time, but now the same company is going to reject it from its latest product’s interface. 

Why skeuomorphism is no longer necessary? 

How many people still need to learn what the virtual trash can is for? Computers are  already indispensable to our schools and jobs; even pre-school children know how to use computers before they learn to read and write. There is no more need for skeuomorphical designs as an intuitive understanding of its function. 

On the contrary, even different problems has arisen in importing designs from the physical object into the digital one. One is that skeuomorphism puts limits on what digital objects can do. While using a trash can on the virtual desktop, three physical action are required to just delete a document: drag it, drop it on the can, and click the empty button. This sequence feels quite bothersome for those who get used to simple and easy practice of smartphones and tablet computers. 

What is the post-skeuomorphic future?

The desktop will be soon outdated as the sales of tablet PCs and smartphones grow. At least, it is the least effective in consuming information over the internet, that is the function today’s users want the most out of computers. Moreover, the conventional system of document reserving and classifying will be completely replaced by sharing and searching over the air. In fact, the virtual desktop can handle a lot of documents on a single screen, but why not possible it is on other forms of interface?

*Article from TIME issued June 3, 2013

WHAT THEY’LL WEAR TO THE REVOLUTION

WHAT THEY’LL WEAR TO THE REVOLUTION

-Can Uniqlo’s retail revolution revive Japan?-

Kiyotaka ISHIKAWA

Where did Uniqlo come from? No one, nor the Japanese, know because the fashion company has grown up so fast since its first big hit of a fleece jacket in 1998. Even after that, Uniqlo has never stopped to scale up its business at an incredible pace—tripled its sales over the recent decade, and now it sells $11.8 billion annually, unlike any other good-price clothing rivals. Also, Uniqlo’s workforce management style is totally different from the conventional Japan Inc.’s way. What do the CEO, Tadashi Yanai, do in the company, and will his style save Japan?

What difference dose Uniqlo make from other “fast fashion” rivals? 

Just a few numbers tell everything. Even though sales at the Gap, one of the most successful reasonable-price fashion brand, have remained almost unchanged over the past decade, Fast Retailing, Uniqlo’s parent company, have tripled to $11.8 billion. However, offering clothes at low prices and showing them at gorgeous stores are not only the reason why Uniqlo makes the difference because just a few minute’s walk from the store can take customers to similar cheap fashion stores. 

The article’s customer interview* says they are attracted by the brand’s reputation for innovative textile technology. For examples, a down coat, one of top-selling items, is responsible for chilly temperatures but compact enough to pack into a small bag. Another recent hit item is underwear made of a special fabric called Heattech, that is a thin but insulated material developed by Fast Retailing. Uniqlo’s distinctive quality is such a sense of matching engineering with design. 

How he runs the company, and why his way is sometimes unwelcome in Japan?

As the product’s quality keep Uniqlo a step ahead of the rivals, the CEO Yanai’s corporate administration make the company remarkable in the society of Japan. As always Japanese characteristic CEO does, Yanai single-handedly controls the firm’s direction and especially  focus on human resource management, saying “each one of us needs to embrace the concept of ‘change or die,’ or there will be no future for us.”

Uniqlo’s employees do not spend their entire careers at the company as usual Japanese workers do in conventional “salaryman” system, but the company is open for those overlooked by other companies, such as workers switching jobs midcareer and senior students who have experience abroad. However, a lot of employees resign their jobs in the company for working long hours, exacting standards and high stress. 

Although this labor management style is unacceptable for traditional Japanese companies that treat their labors as family, just as blaming Fast Retailing as a “black company” that mistreat workers, it is just another way of treating labors that employees are only parts and something replaceable. 

Will Uniqlo’s business structure and new corporate culture save Japan?

Uniqlo’s corporate structure is a very good opportunity for those who think about changing their careers in the middle of life, or who try to make use of their abilities and experiences abroad. The society should understand the new working style practiced by Fast Retailing, and aware that Japan Inc. is not the only way to run the economy, even if that is difficult while a majority of people still live up with the “salaryman” system.

Nevertheless, it is not that all Yanai’s proposals for reviving Japan are quite appropriate. Japanese workers, he says, “never work long hours and that’s the problem,” adding that “Japan got rich, then it got spoiled.” Actually, his statement could be corrected that “we are already too rich to work longer hours.” Japan rather came across a new life stage, than got spoiled, and it is good time for Japan Inc. to think about work-life balance. 

*Article from TIME issued May 13, 2013

What Is My Generation Like?

What Is My Generation Like?

-A Comparison of American “Millennial” Generation to Japan -

Kiyotaka ISHIKAWA

“Millennials” mean an American generation born in 1980s and onward and so include me, whose characteristics are generally described as narcissistic, self-centered, and lack of establishment*. These trends in personality seem more or less common in young people over nationalities who grew up with social networks that enable them self-branding. However, there are various way to adapt this personal preference into society in different culture, and Japan have come up with totally different application from how Americans have done. 

What do Millennials do?

The most characteristic behavior among Millennials is easily found everywhere on the Internet. They constantly hold their camera built in the smart-phones, take pictures of themselves, and post them on the SNS they belong to. When they hung up with friends, they prefer to be surrounded by peers in similar age, but never pay full attention to conversations even at bars because they are seriously anxious about whether they might miss out something better on the SNS timelines. 

Another mental aspect of Millennials is that they have relatively better relationship with their parents than any other previous generations do; in turn, they show stronger dependency on their parents over housing, finance, and decision making at important stage of life. 

Socially, although they look active as observed on the Internet, they have less opportunities to communicate with the older generations. This is partly because society has been innovated into empowering individuals by the emerging Internet-based technology, which allows people to create small (sometimes game-changing) business out of corporations. 

What are social aspects in Japanese youth?

While mental changes by the emergence of social network services are not only in the United States, some changes are quite differently applied into the young in Japan. 

For one thing, widespread smartphones and real-time communication apps among teenagers have made them rather more unselfish than when I was in the ages. They are required immediate response to their friends’ post on the timeline even after school hours, with “marked as read,” “Like,” or something. Otherwise, the friends will think they do not “Like” it, and, at worst, they will find they are alone at school next day. 

Once lost a good distance from friends, the 24h/7d relationship within people at school ages, in turn, bring with mental troubles, severe bullying, and poor achievement in study. Such a social aspect might be seen over every generation in Japan, but it is remarkable among vulnerable ages like teenagers because they are on the process of mental growth and in the closed community.  

*Article from TIME issued May 20, 2013

THE ROLES OF MODERN AGRICULTURE

THE ROLES OF MODERN AGRICULTURE

Kiyotaka ISHIKAWA

The new Abe administration in Japan has revealed its national development strategy in which agriculture is one of the target for the intensive public investment as well as green technologies and advanced medical services. Some people might feel skeptical about this government plan, pointing out that the domestic value from agriculture account only for 1.5% in the total GDP, and moreover, agriculture does not pay in the advanced economy due to the highest labor cost. However, following two stories in Europe suggest agriculture could be the best medicine for the developed region suffering from the prolonged depression. 

The Modern European Tomato -Profitable Structure with New Technologies-*

The Netherlands is the most successful tomato exporter among the EU countries while the country is at 4th in production following Italy, Spain and Greece, yet these countries import tomatoes from the Holland in recent years although the warmer Mediterranean climate is much more suitable for the tomato production. The only difference between the snowy Netherlands and sunny south European countries, excluding the climate, is production efficiency. Dutch growers can get an average of 70kg of tomatoes out of each square meter, using sophisticated growing technologies like the computer controlled greenhouse; on the other hand, Mediterranean growers are lucky if they can get 7kg. The Dutch tomato is not only a good commodity for European consumers but also environmentally friendly due to pesticides free production, resulting in popularity among choosy consumers in Germany, the U.K. and elsewhere. The Netherlands leads vegetable, fruits, and flower exports mainly in the European market as its export value scale of agri-food products is the world’s 2nd next to the United States.

The Young Farmers’ Entry in Italy -Surplus Workers Coming Back to Farms-** 

The financial crisis in Italy has raised an increasing number of unemployed people, some of whom try to restart their career as a farmer; the latest statistic shows the increase rate of workers engaged in the country’s agricultural sector, 10.1% in employee and 2.9% in self-employed, which is far beyond the manufacturing and service industries. They might be out of choice but to work as a farmer if they are poorly educated, but actually 36.5% of  the new farmers below 30 are college graduates and enthusiastic in developing their farm into a large scale exporter by innovative farming technologies such as remotely piloted tractors and online order systems. The government is welcome to this trend and offering a tax reduction on the young farmer’s income and land inheritance, also aggressive for promoting farmland transfer over generations so that young farmers talented in business can extend their production scale and grow the movement into the country’s new income source for the recovery from the depressed economy.  

*TIME, March 11, 2013, pp. 38-42

**Wired.jp, retrieved from
 http://wired.jp/2013/03/22/italy-agriculture/?utm_source=feed&utm_medium=

Precious Holdings

Precious Holdings*

Kiyotaka ISHIKAWA

Rare earths, materials crucial to the production of everything, are hard to identify in those products but have as big stake as oil in our daily lives. For example, our hard disk drives will not work without just a few cents’ worth of neodymium as well as Toyota Prius without a few tens of dollars of dysprosium. Unfortunately, the production of these products have the largest share in Japan’s manufacturing industry, but, what is worse than that is China takes control of almost all rare-earth elements in the global market. While the Chinese government manipulate the prices to get the most from the rare-earth market that is a monopoly of China, Japan have survived over the absolute shortage and price spike of rare earths through 2010 to 2011, which I believe is full of suggestions about Japan’s resource allocation and diplomatic strategy. 

Nature of Rare-Earth Market Controlled by China

The global market of rare earths is not so big. Its scale is only about $2 billion, roughly equal to U.S. chewing-gum sales, but 95% of the global supply is produced by China. The Chinese government know how to maximize the revenue even under the recession after the world financial crisis. Given the decreasing world’s demand and raising cost for labors at mining sites and refineries, the government gradually tightened the amount of rare-earth elements that domestic producers were allowed to export; in 2010, Beijing slashed its export quota by 40%. This triggered a global panic, rising 300% to 1,000% at price depending on the elements, which would be beyond the Chinese authorities have expected. However, they learned China’s position at the rare-earth market can be a diplomatic pressure on Japan; actually, China stopped delivery of rare earths to Japan for two months that is seen as an indirect provocation over the ongoing territorial dispute. 

Japan’s Response Reminds the Oil Shock

Japan, which purchase about two-thirds of China’s rare-earth export, was the country that had the most severe economic impacts from the market’s tight balance. Japan’s economy is heavily reliant on the high-tech manufacturing industry such as the production of electronic-device components and specialized magnets. The government of Japan immediately responded to the global crisis of the rare-earth market by funding $1 billion worth of subsidies to promote this industry to find new sources of rare earths outside China, develop alternative materials and improve recycling. 

The aggressive investment into the development of new suppliers and rare-earth saving technologies seems to be paying off. This response is a speciality of Japan that have a number of achievement in the country’s history; the most remarkable ones are the energy-saving technologies like hybrid cars after the oil shock in which discipline Japan still lead the world. Although the investment is undermining China’s diplomatic superiority to Japan, the rare-earth market is only one of the cards China can play. In order to change the rule of the game, Japan should keep trading with China even if each country has different concerns. Considering refining rare earths is a complex and environmentally hazardous, Japan can provide China with more efficient and green technologies in reward for the stable supply of rear-earth elements. 

*Article from TIME, Feb 18, 2013

Briefing: Tech Issues of Non-technical Problems

Briefing: Tech Issues of Non-technical Problems

Kiyotaka ISHIKAWA

#Three different topics

Man vs. Machine −Why a slowdown in tech progress is good news for jobs−*

The rise of social media, big data and other tech trends are expected to boost the economic growth in the similar way computers changed productivity of business a few decade ago, but what about workers less educated to catch up with the next IT innovation? It is suggested that too fast tech advancement delivers higher unemployment and inequality over income levels which many economists believe in turn slow down the pace of growth. Fortunately, some economic reports show that recent prices for IT equipment like software, computers, and networking technology fall at a much slower pace than the one Moore’s law predicted −computer chips double in power roughly every 18 months; technology is not increasing at the same pace it once did. Given that man’s ability to learn new things are limited, what is the optimal innovation speed that fuels economic growth most efficiently?

Electric-Vehicle −Will discounts persuade the masses to plug in electric cars−*

The electric car is in the middle of technological and also economical development. Cars that use at least some electricity for power accounted for under 3.5% of auto sales in the United States throughout 2012, and pure-electric cars represent a tiny fraction of that. One of the biggest hurdle for plug-in type vehicles is range; for example, Nissan Leaf runs only 130 km for every full-recharge that takes hours. Although range extends dramatically when it comes to the hybrid models that use both gas and battery power, another big problem, price, does not let the green cars prevail over the auto market. Despite generous rebates and tax credits, as much as $10,000 off the price, in addition to savings on gas costs that carmakers push for the purchase motive, today’s price fail to catch most drivers. To what extent do carmakers have to compromise price in order to make the electric cars popular, considering a series of relevant factors like switching costs from gas to electricity for users, potential revenue due to cost-effective mass-production after it gets popular, and social investment into infrastructure like plug-in power stations? 

What Free Costs −A suicide fuels the online copyright fight−**

Aaron Swartz was a top programmer who had thought that every idea and innovation must be open access so that people could share it to better the world, just like other ordinary hackers, but in his case, this was nothing like a policy but a lifelong crusade. He ended up with suicide during his trial with a potential sentence of 35 years in prison on 13 counts of fraud, cybercrime and other charges. One of his most remarkable works is the break into MIT’s repository of scholarly publications from which he downloaded some 4.8 million documents and tried to share them online before he arrested. He felt the articles produced with government funding should be available to all, which turned into s surprising result that the academic database have since released some of its collection for free. After his death, his supporters have encouraged the release of copyrighted materials, and hackers have attacked MIT’s network. How much information should be freely available and how aggressively the government should punish those who released it? 

#Articles from TIME, Jan 28 2013* and Feb 4 2013**

RISE OF THE DRONES

Kiyotaka ISHIKAWA

Military use of unmanned aerial vehicles, or simply drones, has already been popularized over U.S. war zones as tells the news of future installation of the RQ-4 Global Hawk (an unmanned spy plane) into the Senkaku Islands by the government of Japan. However, benefits (and risks) from absence of man are not only for wartime but also for a lot of industrial and commercial applications. A surprising fact about private Drone use is that the most advancing sector is agriculture; the feature of drones, extension of our physical presence, matches the management of vast crop fields, but we face the very problems similar to ones in military drones. 

Drone Use in Wartime 

A solution for Obama administration suffering from the budget deficit was the reduction of the arms budget by the installation of unmanned vehicles, so America’s huge war zones can be covered by cheap remotely piloted vehicles and a few operators. For example, the MQ-1 Predator (an unmanned bomber) costs only a 1/3 billion yens while the latest stealth fighter F-35 is priced at 11 billion yens and more for pilot training**. Although the absence of man on the vehicles has saved money and pilots, however, this may cause a new risk; as the United Nations Human Rights Councils states ‘there is a risk of developing a “Playstation” mentality to killing.’ Whether that is right or not, CIA drone attacks have killed 2,629 to 3,461 people in Pakistan alone, of whom 475 to 891 were civilians*.   

Rising Private Use of Drones

The same reason as the military installation of drones appears over various drone use  amongst many industries including agriculture in which drones are applied to spraying chemicals, correcting soil analysis data and so on. In fact, Japan’s paddy fields sprayed by unmanned helicopters in 2003 accounts for 45% of total rice fields where chemicals in use, and the share of spray drones are growing***. On the other hand, as some environmental organizations warn, sprayers tend to be discouraged from paying attentions to the chemical leakage over neighbors and the natural environment even though much higher concentration of chemicals has been enabled by the unmanned vehicles. 

What the Absence of Man gives and takes

Drones have potentials to extend our physical presence just like the internet has extended our virtual presence; we can perceive situations from a distance and make actions there if you want. This is a fantastic innovation, but we have to care the risk arose from the absence of man as the former case studies suggest. It is typical that some quiet-type people turn into very offensive characters on the Internet communities. Even some people fail to distinguish virtual themselves from the real and keep a good relationship in the real society. Given that extended our physical presence influences directly our lives in the same way the virtual presence does to mentality, it is an imminent and important matter to control the power of drones with development of laws for some certificates or licenses.

*Article from TIME issued Feb 11, 2013

**Video from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6d7lHUMDCrg

***Article from http://wired.jp/2013/02/12/drone-farm/?utm_source=feed&utm_medium=

Your Brain Under Fire

Kiyotaka ISHIKAWA

Gunfire in playing Call of Duty is made in simple combination of your lefthand’s adjusting the stick at enemies and your righthand’s squeezing the trigger with a game-controller. Only these processes sometimes fails or delays in your excited hands when you see that your enemies also point their guns at you which looks about to fire. Such a mistake is a part of the mixture of pleasure and stress in the virtual gunfight, but, in the real gunfight, under much more complex and dynamic situations, that might cause you or those who you need to protect killed in a moment. Are armed guards in U.S. schools really more capable of protecting children from active shooters than banishing all firearms from the country? 

Increasing schools guarded by armed security

About a third of all public schools in the United States already have armed security, and that number may increase after the Newtown shootings, as the NRA’s chairman stated, “The only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun.” However, shooting down a bad guy without unintended shots on innocent people requires highly trained skills and minds. Actually, average NYPD hit rate during a gunfight is only 18% when the target is shooting at officers, while it marks 30% when the target dose not fire back (TIME, issued Jan 28, 2013). Moreover, if hiring an officer or armed educator for the case of school assault, we always have to concerns about the high risk that they will shoot a child by accident. 

Possess a gun not only for shooting someone

It is considerable that the presence of armed teachers or guards could deter a shooter from attacking so that there would be no need to perform well in a gunfight. In fact, New York City police officers rarely fire their weapons in the duty, but the silent presence of officers’ weapons surely influences the behavior of citizens around them. Many gun-rights advocates also worry that vulnerability of gun-free schools may attract shooters, pointing out the deterrent function of keeping the armed security.

Need to consider shooter’s uncertain motive for assault

It is difficult to know if mass murderers apply such logic when choosing targets; not all of them simply seek the most violent crime scenes in order to create socially sensational shock. In the case of the 1999 Columbine High School shooting, for example, the attacking students were aware that their school had an armed officer, who eventually failed to stop the mass murder. Also, some studies shows that two thirds of shooters attack their own communities, no matter which they are easy targets or not, just like the case of Columbine. 

From these perspectives, it is unsure that making every U.S. school protected by armed guards or teachers, even if they are well-trained for emergency, could prevent tragedies like the Newtown’s case for ever, though at least that will minimize the number of such cases happen or victims. Of course, nothing is better than banishing all guns, if putting aside huge political and operational costs that will take in the society where gun-rights are deeply rooted.