The “Ice Age” of Construction in Japan

March is a time of many things in Japan. It’s the dividing line between winter and spring, when people wonder when the beautiful sakura will start to bloom again. For students graduating from junior high or high school, March is the season of sayonara, as friends say goodbye to each other, perhaps taking one final trip to Tokyo Disneyland together. March is also the period before the fiscal year ends for the Japanese government, when municipalities rush to spend the money that’s left in their budgets, which usually means endless road construction causing traffic jams all month long. This year, however, there’s a new government in power that has promised to switch its focus “from concrete to humans.” Many projects have been unceremoniously cut, including budgets for roads and other public works, effectively creating an “ice age” for the construction industry. I’m certainly not in favor of building roads that don’t need to be built, and the previous ruling party proved unable to resist the temptation of expensive building projects, often structured to benefit the politicians who helped make the projects possible. Still, a few years ago there’d have been no less than three crews of construction workers doing various road maintenance between J-List and my dentist this time of year, but these days I can’t recall the last time I had to wait for road work. I wonder if it might not be too much change, too quickly?

Japan’s construction industry is experiencing an “ice age” right now.