"My life is so wretched." "Mine too."

According to the Japan Times on 3/13/07:

Workers from all parts of the globe battled wind and rain Sunday to give speeches, performances and then trudge through the streets of Shibuya, Tokyo, calling for job security and equality for all.

"This march is about raising people's awareness about the job situation in Japan, especially for foreigners," said an American woman dressed as the pink rabbit mascot for Nova, the nation's biggest chain of English-language schools. "It keeps getting worse and worse, with job contracts and other common problems.

...Social insurance and pensions are also equally serious issues, he said. "A lot of foreign workers are not enrolled in 'shakai hosho' (social security), which is against the law. It puts people at a great risk of hardship if they suffer from an illness or an accident."

http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/nn20070313a4.html

That the job situation in Japan is getting worse is right. However, it is not limited to foreigners. Most Japanese citizen with low income aren't enrolled in social security either. Some of them are getting nationalistic or even xenophobic because they suspect that their jobs would be taken from foreigners. I don't think, though, that their reasoning isn't right. Same as in the US maybe, there are some richers who never pay their taxes and who are contributing to the nation's huge debt, and both low income Japanese citizens and foreign citizens are forced to pay for it.

The job situation of American and British language teachers in Japan is relatively good because they can get good money. But, Chinese, Korean, Peruvian, Brazilian people in Japan are having a hard time.