Japan is running in the fast lane of information technology, yet it has been relatively slow in one vital area: employment of foreign IT engineers. Part of the reason seems to lie in the nation's deep-seated reluctance to open the labor market wider to foreigners.
A comment by a senior central government bureaucrat helps explain that reluctance: If we take in many talented people from abroad, there will be fewer jobs available to Japanese people. As a result, young people from developing countries could end up doing "3-K" jobs they dislike -- jobs that are "kitsui" (hard), "kitanai" (dirty) and "kiken" (dangerous).
The comment came in reaction to the following remarks by the head of an IT venture firm: "We have excellent Chinese and Indian engineers working with us, and they are making great contributions to the company. But many Japanese firms hold them in low esteem because they are from developing countries. Japan is a backward country when it comes to hiring foreign IT engineers."