Saturday, September 15, 2007

Japanese Women Sweat at Home, Japanese Men at Work

according to these stories:

"Japanese Wives Sweat as Markets Reel," NY Times.

"Japan's War on Air Conditioning," Wall Street Journal (subscription req'd -- it's a good deal for students).

4 comments:

yukki said...

Stock markets are like Pachinko to me---both are gambling. Poor Mrs. Itoh's husband... he's sweating at his company, while his wife lost tons of their money...

j.taylor said...

Hmm... Since we're in NY, I guess someone has to defend stock markets.

A first point is that people can gamble on anything, from football games to the order in which a teacher will call on students in class. The fact that some people gamble shouldn't automatically condemn the underlying activity.

Second, stock markets play an important role in helping companies raise money. Potential investors are more willing to buy an ownership stake in a company, and at a less favorable price, if they know that they can turn around and sell their stake easily to other investors. Companies can use the money to grow and compete, which theoretically helps everyone in a market economy.

I agree that stock-picking looks a lot like gambling. But doesn't every decision that will have uncertain future consequences have a gambling aspect?

yukki said...

Sure, everything in our life is a gamble. I can't agree with you more about that. I just said stock markets are like Pachinko because so many people forget to put limits and ruin their lives. Anything too much usually ends up with something bad, doesn't it?

Unknown said...

Japanese women look nice mostly because of how they dress!

Japanese women try so hard to be looked nice and more like models on the magazines but no t so much by working out to have an actual nice toned body but by dressing up and make-up. You may be able to see a lot of Japanese women in the major cities go to the gym regularly but not so much in suburb areas. Japanese women are typically small and thin already, but a lot of them still want to be thinner to be like a runaway model. Anyway, the point here is that they know how to dress nice that match with their thin figures but still sexy. A lot of men are attracted by their look with those clothes on.

- See more at: A little surprising fact of Japanese women