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I saw this article linked below today and thought that one thing the government (or someone!) ought to do to address the growing inequality in Japan is to stop centralizing all the jobs around Tokyo.  Certainly, there are plenty of jobs around the country here, but the best jobs are almost exclusively located in Tokyo.

The biggest problem I see (outside of the fact that most Japanese companies are fucking dead cheap in terms of paying their non-executive staff) is that many people's parents live far away from Tokyo.  The people, whose parents live in closer suburbs like Saitama, Yokohama, or Chiba, are more fortunate since they can live at home and save money.

However, those who live in cities like Fukushima, Fukuoka, Yamagata, Aomori, etc. face a serious disadvantage by comparison.  They cannot take advantage of using their parents' home as a base of operations while climbing up the social ladder.  The ones that face the biggest hardships are the lesser skilled ones (i.e. temp staff or hakken staff).

The problem in Tokyo is that the cost of living is just unreasonable for anyone earning less than 6,000,000-en.  If the government forces companies to move away from Tokyo or offer incentives like tax breaks and spread better jobs around the country, it'll improve several things:

• Decrease the cost of living by decreasing the demand for living in Tokyo.
• Nurture growth and economies in other cities.
• Decrease the density in Tokyo.
• Decrease the overcrowded situation in the subways.
• Internationalize other cities in Japan by attracting foreigners who are NOT JUST English teachers.

Even adding business centers in areas like Saitama would help a great deal.  There are some business areas slightly outside of Tokyo like Chiba's Makuhari or Yokohama/Kawasaki.  But there simply isn't enough where companies do enough to localize themselves around suburbs.  Instead, there's some odd/stupid theory where centralizing jobs in Tokyo would pull in all the people from the suburbs, thereby generating a great deal of diversity in terms of skills and talent.

But I think that it really doesn't matter after a certain point.  Tokyo should be reserved for only the most elite companies and jobs, at least if they're going to retain the high cost of living.  Smaller companies should attempt to grow new business centers outside of Tokyo, not local offices, but actual concentrations of types of businesses.  Kinda like how you have film people in Hollywood, Securities in Manhattan, tech jobs in Silicon Valley, etc.  That way you can scale the cost of living to the industry, rather than generalizing it for everyone.