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Less Yen for Foreign Travel In Aging, Risk-Averse Japan
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"They are conservative and not adventurous, with a lot of fear of terrorism and disease," he said. "They have all the consumer products they want here in Japan. Big-screen LCD televisions give them clear images of distant places, so they feel they don't have to go see them.
"Rather than go see a different culture, their main objective is to spend quality time with their friends. They feel very comfortable at home. They feel they don't need to look for comfort outside the home."
Even when young people do hunger for overseas adventure, many can no longer afford it.
A major reason for that is the emergence in the past 15 years of a large part-time workforce, which now includes about a third of all employed Japanese. Part-time jobs, which are held disproportionately by people in their 20s, tend to pay less and offer less generous vacation benefits than the corporate positions that were widely on offer before the Japanese economy nose-dived in the 1990s.
The rising cost of jet fuel is also squeezing overseas travel. In three years, fuel surcharges have risen more than six-fold on flights to Europe and the United States.
Although the Japanese are not seeing the world as much as they used to, the world is seeing them, at home, more than ever. Visa restrictions for tourists have been eased, and the number of foreigners visiting Japan is expected to exceed 9 million this year, a record.
Most of the visitors -- who come to shop, eat, ski, sightsee and hang out in spas -- are from Japan's fast-growing Asian neighbors, China, South Korea and Taiwan. Prices here have risen little in the past decade, and the country has become something of a bargain, at least compared with Western Europe.
There has been little grumbling here about "hordes" of foreign visitors, some of whom travel in large groups with noisy guides. The Japanese know about group travel, and they welcome it. Their economy is growing much more slowly than those of their neighbors. They need the business.
