Money matters: Japan - land of the rising bank balance

By MARY HOLM

Q. While your advice seems generally sound, I have to disagree strongly with your point that the doctor is no better off saving/working in London to pay off his loan, as opposed to staying in New Zealand. (See last week's Money Matters.)

I went to Japan to pay off debt in this way and was far better off. In New Zealand, a teaching job pays $30,000 a year. In Japan I was paid about $NZ96,000.

While my expenses were similar as a percentage, my savings amplified. If I saved 10 per cent of my NZ income I would have $3000; for the same percentage in Japan, it was $9600 - clearly a huge advantage.

I did it, and it has set me up nicely. I would always encourage this as a means to pay debt and have a useful OE.

The amplification of savings encouraged me to save a lot more than 10 per cent.


A. Hang on a minute, mate. I wasn't the one who said the doc would be no better off in London. That was someone who wrote to me.

While I have no reason to doubt what he said, I certainly don't want to be held responsible for what readers write.

Next thing, someone will expect me to answer for a bloke who wrote that, just because he's better off living and saving in Japan than in NZ, the same must apply to London!

England and Japan are pretty different. Read on:

Q. I agree with the respondent who pointed out that juicy UK salaries barely match truly incredible prices for reasonable housing, food, alcohol, tax ... actually, nearly everything in London.

My partner and I have lived in Japan for three years and are moving to London next year.

Having accepted the received wisdom that Japan - Tokyo in particular - is the most expensive place to live, I was stunned to find that London leaves it for dead as far as consuming a hard-earned wage.

Our research (including a recent holiday in to Europe) into jobs, property, taxes, food and leisure costs almost has us signing on for a few more years in the big J.

Both of us have been able to save more than 50 per cent of our pre-tax salaries while averaging seven weeks of international travel in each of the three years we've been here.

In part this is because of the low tax rate (less than 10 per cent) and teaching privately on the side (a lot) and not owning a car.

To get the same take-home pay from my old job at Telecom would have resulted in my salary being listed in the annual report!

Living in Japan is not easy and requires day-to-day sacrifices (beer, for example) if you want to save, but I think the reality here is what a lot of Kiwis wrongly imagine Britain to be vis-a-vis net income.

PS: Internet newspapers are a godsend, eh?


* A. Brace yourself, Japan. On the strength of these two letters, you might be in for a Kiwi invasion.