Urmas Teder, journalist
Japan’s immigration debate has entered a curious new phase. According to recent proposals put forward by Sanseitō leader Sōhei Kamiya, foreign residents should face stricter access to welfare benefits, public funds and social assistance. They should be expected to embrace Japan’s cultural homogeneity, while those reaching old age would, in principle, return to their countries of origin rather than remain in Japan. Japanese nationals, naturally, would receive priority.
Every sovereign state has the right to determine its immigration policy. Governments may decide who enters, who stays and under which conditions. Yet immigration policy also rests on an unwritten contract: those who contribute to society should reasonably expect to share in the protections that society provides. It is precisely this balance that these proposals appear to challenge.
Foreign residents already contribute much like everyone else. They pay income tax, resident tax, pension contributions, health insurance premiums and long-term care insurance. They finance the same public services and help sustain a social security system under increasing demographic pressure. Their obligations are rarely described as temporary, even if their presence sometimes is.
If, however, access to welfare is to become conditional on nationality rather than contribution, perhaps the discussion should be broadened. Should foreign residents also pay lower taxes? Should they be exempt from pension contributions if they are not expected to spend their retirement in Japan? Should they contribute less to long-term care insurance if the expectation is that they will leave before ever benefiting from it? Consistency, after all, is also a public virtue.
The underlying message seems difficult to ignore: foreign workers are welcome while they remain economically productive, but considerably less so once they cease to be. It is an approach that risks reducing people to temporary economic inputs rather than long-term members of society. A labour force may be imported; a community cannot.
There is also a practical question. Japan faces one of the world’s most severe demographic challenges and increasingly competes internationally for skilled workers. Convincing talented professionals to build their lives in Japan becomes considerably harder if the social contract appears to expire the day their productivity declines.
A country is fully entitled to define the conditions under which foreigners may live within its borders. But equal obligations without broadly comparable rights create an uncomfortable imbalance. If foreign residents are expected to contribute like citizens, they should not be treated like consumables-valuable while in use, easily discarded once worn.
