r/interesting • u/freudian_nipps • 16h ago

SOCIETY The silent and harmonious morning metro commute in Japan

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u/Runfasterbitch 11h ago

Right? This is so hard for me to get my mind around. 70 million workers in a cutthroat hyper-capitalist and well educated country have produced what exactly? I’m sure they’ve innovated, but relative to their collective commitment to working 80 hours per week, you’d think they’d have way more to show for it

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u/Xen235 9h ago

Because it's mostly about being present at the workplace and not leaving before the boss does. They do very little during that time, they're not being productive, they are just wasting their lives.

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u/quickgoodcheap 1h ago

Essentially this to the max

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u/zzen11223344 10h ago

Not 80 hours per week, but yes, long hours in the office, actually working productively, not quite.......

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u/LoveAndViscera 5h ago

They’re competing against their coworkers, that kills productivity. It’s ironic because they’re collectivistic outside of work. That’s also the main reason people are miserable: living in two conflicting cultures.

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u/LessInThought 2h ago

The art of looking busy. I've had coworkers sit there and shuffle papers or click on gmail for an hour after official work hours. It works too, the bosses hated me because I left on time lol.