Japan's Highly Skilled Foreign Worker Visas Plunged 40% as AI Replaces IT and Translation Roles
PAstynome · x · 2026-09-15
A cited post shares striking real-world data: new approvals of Japan's "Highly Skilled Professionals" visa for foreign workers plunged 40% last year. Most of those workers had come for IT or translation jobs — categories whose demand, the author argues, AI has effectively gutted, with Japanese companies now preferring to have existing local staff do the work with AI tools.
The prediction: Japanese immigration will skew toward blue-collar technical apprentices (until robotics matures) plus wealthier expats using Japan as a base.
The main poster adds that if AI boosts productivity and wages, it's good for Japan — addressing a decades-old problem — though the dual-economy issue remains unresolved.
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