South Korea to give $490 allowance to reclusive youths to help them leave house

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/apr/13/south-korea-to-give-490-allowance-to-reclusive-youths-to-help-them-leave-the-house

by acqbu • 3 years ago

180 239 3 years ago

theguardian.com

fallat• 3 years ago

Honestly a great idea. Not being able to afford outings is a huge barrier to socializing.

danjoredd• 3 years ago

Lets hope they spend it on being social! Going to social events, clubs, get togethers, etc.

Thing is though, when I think of when I was 17, I spent almost every penny of every paycheck at my job on video games and movies, and all my friends were the same way.

tokai4• 3 years ago

If you are withdrawn enough, just going to buy groceries is a win.

AlecSchueler• 3 years ago

There's an app for that!

ilaksh3• 3 years ago

They may need to save it. Don't underestimate the financial aspect of this.

skizm• 3 years ago

I mean you had friends so you probably wouldn’t fall into this category.

dabluecaboose3• 3 years ago

I have to imagine there's some sort of requirement to continue receiving the allowance, otherwise isn't this just giving them $450 to spend on more anime figurines?

whstl• 3 years ago

Funny.

When I was 17 I also spent most of my money on video games, but it actually helped me socialize a lot because pretty much none of us had internet.

The more I think about those problems, the more I see the internet as the big culprit.

ogurechny6• 3 years ago

I suppose the allowance is only given in presence, so they have to leave house to get it. Very creative!

worrycue• 3 years ago

Doesn't mean much though. A shut-in can usually handle occasionally leaving the house.

I wonder if they have to spend the money in person too.

It's all moot if they spend it all via ordering on the internet and paying cash on delivery.

rasengan3• 3 years ago

The affordability for sure helps a small cohort but there are a lot of other reasons not to leave the house that have yet to be addressed. Some of these can’t be addressed by government as there are fundamentally decentralized yet aligned issues relating to culture among other things (for example, SK really shuns baldness [1] so they don’t go outside).

[1] https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=jLhNYl3HVTU

908B64B197• 3 years ago

Giving money is nice, but I wonder how much of the problem is due to the incredible pressure put on young people by the traditional Korean society. Dating seems to be closed off to a large number of Koreans who don't see a path toward marriage and economic prosperity.

Interestingly, a lot of Korean woman seem to think the best place to start a family is ... right here in America! The gender ratio of immigrants to America from South Korea isn't 50-50 as one would expect but closer to 60% women. For Japan, another state struggling with fertility and youth isolation, this ratio is about 75%.

tokai4• 3 years ago

Ain't both countries very big on male chauvinism? Makes sense that they want to leave more than the men.

nicolas_t• 3 years ago

Anecdotal but when I lived there, I had a few female coworkers who confided to me that they only wanted to date foreigners because they felt trapped by the cultural expectations that came with dating a Japanese man. So, yes it might be a factor :)

rasengan3• 3 years ago

You hit the nail on the head. The culture is very male focused, even despite the male-rights movements that have come about recently.

Go out drinking in Asia... and you'll be pretty surprised, shocked, upset, dismayed at how things work over there.

Der_Einzige2• 3 years ago

Correct, cheating is basically normalized among men in east and south east Asia. Western mens liberalism and lower rates of cheating are among the many reasons why westerners are popular there.

ogurechny6• 3 years ago

People like to fantasize about “The Orient” when reading topics like those, but the problem is the same across the whole globalized society. We may ask why it became so pronounced in Asia, or we may have a realization that this is the actual future everyone's heading, but it's certainly not some “traditional” thing (unless, of course, there was a tradition like that I have no idea about).

stuckinhell3• 3 years ago

I'm a South Korean woman living in US but I've been traveling to visit family more, and I have a great deal of opposite anecdotes. There is a huge "trad" blow up on tiktok and other social media in South Korea right now.

A lot of the western reporting on South Korea is highly highly skewed. It's a society that demands a lot from both women and men (for better or worse). For example, in America a lot more women get plastic surgery, however I know many more korean MEN than women that have plastic surgery.

yieldcrv3• 3 years ago

There is a huge "trad" blow up on tiktok

this is happening in the US too

the "tradwife" trend is ... kind of refreshing. I was really confused to meet one in real life last month, I couldn't tell that she was being serious, I thought she was being a caricature of what she thought I wanted to hear. Like always steering the conversation towards things involving cooking, sewing, in the most contrived ways.

ZephyrBlu• 3 years ago

What plastic surgery do Korean men get? I've heard that double eyelid surgery is very common for Korean women, so I'm surprised you know more men who have had plastic surgery.

diveandfight2• 3 years ago

Any sources to clarify this observation?

One reason I ask is because if one is just looking at the Korean-American population as a whole, there are a couple other factors that could be leading to the gender imbalance:

- Mothers raising their kids in U.S. while the father works in Korea

- Historic immigration after the Korean War, during which a large portion of the male population was wiped out

COGlory2• 3 years ago

This is damn near what PhD students get paid in the US

juujian• 3 years ago

Ouch!

wenc4• 3 years ago

490 a month? No it is not.

COGlory2• 3 years ago

$16k/year is not that uncommon. After taxes and fees, it's really not that far off.

alsodumb• 3 years ago

I don't know where you're doing your PhD but this absolutely not true.

selimthegrim3• 3 years ago

It was true about a decade ago (a UC in chemistry)

lordnacho• 3 years ago

One thing that came to mind recently is this imaginary subsidy that I came up with:

Give people money to go and eat a meal with strangers. A sit-down meal at a restaurant where you can talk.

I think this would benefit society immensely:

- New random connection, outside your bubble

- Someone who you can talk to, who might have a different point of view

- Making it real that there are other people than the ones you know

haliskerbas• 3 years ago

Immediately imagining another random person asking me “but what part of arabic are you from” even though I’m not middle eastern.

jarebear6expepj• 3 years ago

What better opportunity to educate!

rocketflumes• 3 years ago

I love this idea in principle, but when our school ran something similar to connect grad students who didn't have the opportunity to socialize due to covid remote work, I got a feeling some of them just showed up for the free coffee (we did free coffee chats instead of meals) and just weren't that interested in the social aspect.

luckylion• 3 years ago

Would that be a problem? I mean, you want them to socialize, and they'll do for a while, even if not for "the right reasons".

If some of them do so more because the free coffee is that valuable to them, what's the downside with letting them have the free coffee you wanted to give away anyhow? Imho that would be a good opportunity to get them more support, not a problem with that approach.

bheadmaster• 3 years ago

You can't give people free stuff and then complain when they only come for free stuff. That was literally the whole tactic - that people will come for the free stuff, and some of them might also engage in the secondary activity.

vuln4• 3 years ago

free coffee

They showed up for a sub $1/a cup coffee. I doubt there is much malicious intent.

LorenPechtel2• 3 years ago

I can't imagine it being worth the trip for just the coffee. Rather, I think they were just too isolated for whatever reason to socialize.

Tozen7• 3 years ago

This concept can work outside the context of a school, as various coffee shops and social gatherings are conducive to it. Doesn't have to be coffee, could be wine and cheese, beers from around the world, or other light offerings.

The "trick" to it, in regards to dating opportunities, is the place has to be quietly accepted as a "safe" hookup spot, as well as have a good setup for people to move around and talk to each other. What I mean by setup, is the design of the place. Like having lots of benches or chairs in a row or parallel to each other, not facing (can make people uncomfortable when approached by strangers) or far across from each other (which can cause yelling as hard for people to hear each other), where people can easily sit next to each other. It also must be accepted or encouraged by the staff, managers, or owners that people there, even though strangers, can approach and talk to each other. Bad behavior is not accepted, but polite talking is.

It's tricky, because women will avoid or condemn a place that gets a bad reputation (which is easy to create on social media), be it deserved or not. The place has to be considered safe, cheap, respectful, welcoming, and fun. The combination of such appears hard to get right, so can be hard to find. Places that are good for such socializing, can also be surprising and unexpected ones. And when people do find them, they tend to be quiet about them, to avoid it getting a bad reputation (which can ruin it).

Many places that seem like they could or should work for socializing or hookups, often are actually bad. Be it the design (separate tables that are far apart) or the environment that's created (talking to strangers discouraged). For instance, if those managing it or owners are overly protective or strict, then people may come just and only for say the coffee. No talking to others, drink up, then leave or be nearly completely absorbed into a computer or smartphone. The environment, which encourages and allows polite socializing, has to be created and maintained.

ogurechny6• 3 years ago

The result would be people eating their meals awkwardly in silence. That is, if you somehow manage to make them join that experiment.

bluGill6• 3 years ago

Some people will. However most people are enough more social that they will attempt a conversation. If you only put two people together than silence will happen. However if you can get 4 new people at a table odds are at least 2 will start a conversation and the rest will join at least a little.

I used to go to such 4 random people paired up for a meal, then a different 4 next month. (back before work form home my office had a system to match people like that - even though it was a work sponsored program we almost never talked about work even when there was senior management at the table). Even though I'm the silent type there was always a conversation that I ended up joining in. Sure it was work for me to join the conversation, but it was still worth it.

tokai4• 3 years ago

The Human Library is a project much like what you are describing.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Human_Library

artificial2• 3 years ago

In the same spirit as this we have a “donut buddy” system in slack that randomly pairs you with someone from another org. Some user entered topics are listed such as entertainment and cuisine to kickstart conversations. It’s been a great way to humanize things. I’d love to do this in person.

Minor expansion: The bot handles the calendar coordination, too. Meets are 30 minutes and finish with a screenshot posted to the channel and end of the year there's a collage that's created. I'm fond of the stats.

loopdoend• 3 years ago

Cool idea. It seems like there is some intrinsic motivation when doing this at a workplace that would be missing with random strangers.

bluefirebrand2• 3 years ago

My workplace had something like this and everyone opted out.

I didn't realize everyone had opted out until I got matched with the same person several times in a row. Turns out we were the only two people still left in it.

Which is funny because the company did those Myers-Briggs tests and I scored as one of the most introverted people in the company.

Edit: And no, I don't put much stock in that sort of personality test, but the company did it and it was interesting to see the results, especially compared against "This is where most of your coworkers landed and here's you"

Workaccount2• 3 years ago

I can't imagine this going any other way than a program dominated by the mostly socially uncomfortable types of people, resulting in "going out out to eat" but going to a cafe and sitting separately and on their phone the whole time.

foobarbecue• 3 years ago

You probably need a no phones rule.

ilaksh3• 3 years ago

As a reclusive person I will tell you a big part of it is not having financial security and therefore not having social status or good health. I don't have the time or energy and it's uncomfortable telling people how your life is going. Your bank account really is your status to a large degree. Low status, health issues, no extra energy, I don't really want to be around other people anyway.

baja_blast2• 3 years ago

Yes but in this case you'd be sharing a meal with people who share your experience. They will understand your struggles since they are also struggling.

duxup2• 3 years ago

No doubt that plan wouldn't work for everyone, but maybe some.

yobbo• 3 years ago

This seems like the most realistic take. They are not voluntarily reclusive but rather ostracized/excluded for being failures/losers relative to the social standards of their societies.

Subsidies don't seem so bad. (If done right, they'll have to figure that out.) Even if they don't solve the whole problem immediately.

zvmaz2• 3 years ago

Maybe being temperamentally an introvert has little connection with social status, but you pointed to something I haven't thought about before: how low social status can lead to seclusion. I wonder if there's been studies on that.

safety1st• 3 years ago

Yeah I don't think it's a good idea either. A person in the situation you describe unfortunately is also likely to have a bad self-image. There's no guarantee that a conversation with a stranger is going to go well for them. If the person they have dinner with reacts negatively in some way it may upset them a great deal and reinforce their negative self-beliefs.

What they need is more money in the bank and perhaps access to counseling services. (That's the best I can come up with, at any rate.)

bluGill6• 3 years ago

You are reading Hacker News. While I don't know your personal situation, the odds are strongly in favor of your personally making at least 3 times the average person. which is to say you have a spending problem not an income problem. I get it, I like my toys and luxury as well, but I know a few people who are living and raising kids on less than the average income and they are not doing that bad in life.

belugacat2• 3 years ago

When I lived in Oxford, UK (as a broke student) one of the cheapest places to get dinner on my street was a restaurant with a few very long tables with benches on each side. It was usually pretty full, so you’d always meet interesting people if you were the kind of person to walk in there in the first place.

They didn’t pay you to do so though.

I haven’t found many places like this later in my life, which is too bad. I’m currently on the island of Réunion, which I understand used to have very similar setups, but not many are left. For all I know the one in Oxford doesn’t exist anymore; I last went there almost 2 decades ago.

baja_blast2• 3 years ago

Oxford is such a cool city, I lived there as a kid.

ceejayoz• 3 years ago

I haven’t found many places like this later in my life, which is too bad.

Amtrak dining cars! You get seated with random people for your dinner reservation. I found it delightful.

BoxOfRain• 3 years ago

I currently work in Oxford, where is/was this place? It sounds cool, I might pay a visit and see if it's still around!

sokoloff• 3 years ago

I think that style is still somewhat common in high density, high turnover places (stadiums, festivals, beer gardens, etc.)

I happened to eat at a place like that in Boston last night, except for the part about it being inexpensive. It was TimeOut over near Fenway Park (a baseball stadium). All the tables were just long slabs of wood in the center of an old warehouse while food and drink vendors were all around the outside. Get your food/drink and grab a spot on the long tables.

rasengan3• 3 years ago

Sometimes, I think there is a sort of social "pre-filter" that occurs that helps to keep people "safe" when meeting new people (e.g., go to a friend's party and someone is friends with someone). This isn't perfect, but over the years it's helped considerably. I totally wholeheartedly agree that meeting new people is a great thing.

But in practice, this could lead to quite a few people getting screwed over in some way shape or form by people with terrible agendas. :(

throwaway743• 3 years ago

That on top of the $490 could work, but likely minimal results with the free meal/social outting alone for reclusive type.

Side thought tho, if the allowance was included, in addition to the free meal with a stranger, it could potentially increase birth rates, which would then benefit their economy.

Edit: Just saw it'd be for ages 9-24... thought it was for adults. Hopefully teen pregnancies would be avoided

tcmart14• 3 years ago

I don't know about a meal, but a coffee would be good. But that is a small point. This would be kinda of cool. I have two small kids and I don't know if anyone else is like myself or my wife, but we don't really have friends anymore. All my connection with other adults is my wife, her family and co-workers. But co-workers are just work place connections. I wonder if other people with young kids would find this useful? I mean, my wife and I enjoy each other's company, but we don't really have any non-family and non-work connections. It would be nice to have a conversation with another adult that isn't about uncle jimbo's DUI he got last weekend or a work project.

chasd002• 3 years ago

schedule some play dates with people at school/daycare. play dates are as much for the parents as they are for the kids. Many of the family friends my wife and I have were actually made by our kids being friends at school first.

SuoDuanDao• 3 years ago

I had a similar idea when I was in Vancouver - get people who would like a home-cooked meal to sit down for dinner with new immigrants looking to practice English. I mostly thought of students, but anyone could participate.

traceroute66• 3 years ago

Give people money to go and eat a meal with strangers.

Given the subject line of this discussion includes the word "South Korea", I suggest you ask Mr Google about mukbang.

monkeynotes• 3 years ago

What's to stop the money being spent on video games and red bull, basically reinforcing the problem?

chasd002• 3 years ago

isn't this what meetup.com was made for? Not sure if it still exists but socializing events with strangers was what it was all about.

To have any hope of getting people out of their bedroom you're going to have to remove all data connections. The endorphin release from a browser/app is enough to keep people satisfied being alone, you're going to have to remove that and get them to seek it elsewhere.

lostgame2• 3 years ago

Yeaaaaah, until that stranger ends up being a total sketchbag.

As a woman, unless I'm meeting other women I'd never feel safe about this. Even so, it would be weird.

Could never be down for this, and I'm only half a recluse.

charlieyu1• 3 years ago

I will bring my smartphone just so I don’t have to talk with strangers

jollyllama• 3 years ago

Let the NeetBux flow

AdrianB12• 3 years ago

So instead of looking for the root cause of the problem (probably many factors, not just one), the government is doing what a stupid government is always doing: throw some money at the problem hoping it will be effective enough to win the next election. It is not solving any problem, just rolling it for later.

SK has a huge demographic problem; this one cannot be fixed later, when people are in their 40-es or even 50-es they cannot have babies anymore. Also giving money to 9 year old to socialize is weird, one would rather have them do team activities like sport or boy/girl/mixed scout, not give money - what financial culture does a 9-year old have?

BlargMcLarg• 3 years ago

one would rather have them do team activities like sport or boy/girl/mixed scout

Plenty of developed countries where mixed team activities are the norm and the fertility rates aren't looking that much better once you filter first/second generation immigrants (including, many are already bordering on Japan's levels).

Having them do sports together until the age of 18 isn't going to solve the increasing cost of milestones, consumerism, increasing standards pushed by multimedia, crushing work cultures, pushing the norm to 30+, and more. Several of the aforementioned countries don't have half of these and still sit at 1.6 or less, while continuing to drop.

AdrianB12• 3 years ago

I am considering team sports as a way to (secondary) socialize, not to produce kids. Same for boy scout type of activities, in my experience people that do activities in nature get stronger spirits and are better at handling adverse conditions - for example kids in the Switzerland or Finland do a lot of outside activities at school.

dahwolf• 3 years ago

Doesn't hurt to try, but I don't think giving money to a depressed isolated person will change their ways. They've "pulled back" and somehow manage to get by financially without putting in any effort.

Anyway, I recently read that if one is to project SK's birth rate far into the future, the country ceases to exist: 94% population decrease. There was also an article describing a rural area where for the first time in 25(!) years, a baby was born.

LorenPechtel2• 3 years ago

I am not surprised at a rural area where babies are rare.

The thing is opportunity is generally far greater in the cities. People who aren't failures will generally move to the cities, the rural areas have few people of an age to be reproducing.

BitwiseFool• 3 years ago

It is unfortunate that no one has found a way to replicate or imitate the lifestyle of living on a college campus. I very much miss dormitory style living and the social aspect of it. While I'm happy to have my own living space that is much larger than any dorm room, I miss all the novelty and variety that the dorms brought to my life.

doix• 3 years ago

Not quite the same, but hostels give me a similar vibe. Sometimes I'll book a private room in a hostel even though it's more expensive than an entire Airbnb apartment. Makes it much easier to have things to do.

lddemi• 3 years ago

Living in a medium-sized city can easily provide this type of lifestyle if you want it.

DwnVoteHoneyPot2• 3 years ago

Dorms are pretty unique. A bunch of people same age, going through same experience, in a shared living space. I'd be interested in how this is replicated in a medium-sized city.

peter3032• 3 years ago

The founder of WeWork was talking about creating this kind of housing- private bedrooms (and mainly bathrooms too), kitchen, living rooms shared. A monthly fee for frequent cleaning of public spaces, because voluntary efforts not so successful.

An issue would be maintaining the age segregation of a college. Single adults of all ages may want to move in.

breakpointalpha• 3 years ago

Easy fix is to bracket by age. 18-25, 25-35, 35-45, etc. Self select into an older or younger bracket based on your interests.

If WeWork wasn't so bonkers, I'd consider giving it a try.

iamerroragent• 3 years ago

Already a business:

https://www.podshare.com/

reducesuffering2• 3 years ago

Rationalist group houses have somewhat replicated this in Berkeley.

theobromananda2• 3 years ago

They have also succeeded in replicating campus rape:

https://web.archive.org/web/20230308071256/https://everythin...

https://www.clearlysafe.co/rape-and-race

OkayPhysicist3• 3 years ago

Sufficiently affluent senior communities are pretty much private universities without the professors, and with larger rooms. Complete with frankly surprisingly good food that everybody complains about and more facilities than anybody actually uses.

MuffinFlavored• 3 years ago

Won't they just spend it on video games/electronics related things?

qikInNdOutReply• 3 years ago

Ah, a little light carrotsnack, after which the beatings can continue until working moral improves. A society so hostile, that people withdraw from it completely is surely able to change the situation, without any changes to itself.

I think the best idea would be hikikomori villages. As in standalone towns, were the rest of society is forbidden to enter. Allow them to start something fresh, untainted by the old horror.

ElevenLathe• 3 years ago

William Gibson's /Idoru/ runs with this concept but, somewhat counterproductively in this context, as a virtual version of the old Kowloon Walled City "in" Hong Kong, where hikikomori socialize, strategize about shared goals, wheel and deal, etc.

Eumenes• 3 years ago

Gonna prob go to Roblox money printer

chillbill• 3 years ago

I don't think it's the lack of money that's stopping them from leaving.

duxup2• 3 years ago

I think it is just intended as an incentive here. Get the ball rolling and see what happens.

staringback• 3 years ago

Next headline: 1 bedroom apartments increase by $490/mo

jldugger2• 3 years ago

Yes but also so much worse: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeonse

OkayPhysicist3• 3 years ago

That seems significantly preferable to a rent-based system. While you're not investing any assets in your home like you would if you owned it, at least you're not hemorrhaging cash like you do when you're renting.

badpun3• 3 years ago

From what I understand, hikkikomori usually live with their parents.

pigtailgirl• 3 years ago

-- hard to say if this will work - i know - visit - people who have not left the house in over a year - they are very genius people who never made - to Samsung or LG or other chaebol - many have gained a lot of weight or are unhappy with appearance - genius and "ugly" - depressed - in Korean culture - not good --

dj_mc_merlin• 3 years ago

Just curious: why is your comment written like that? TTS?

zitterbewegung• 3 years ago

Honestly I hope this works . It is very close to universal basic income and the justification for UBI will just become larger and larger. What I feel that we will be in situations where smaller and smaller amounts of people are able to be ridiculously productive .

peter3032• 3 years ago

I wonder how prevalent hikikomori is in the US?

It is similar to agoraphobia in US and Europe. One google reference says 2.4%, i.e. similar to Korea number.

stainablesteel5• 3 years ago

i'd like to see subsidies for people to start families

screw taking out loans to feed money to the college cartels

the equivalent of any bachelors degree is available online, minus lab hours - but you can actually get that if you really want it

have people finish with their education by or before ~18 y/o. people who would have earned meritocratic scholarships can instead be subsidized to start a family and have children for the next ~10 years, this would allow more of the best to have more children -> a breeding experiment with a good outcome

dabluecaboose3• 3 years ago

i'd like to see subsidies for people to start families

I remember seeing a proposal to that effect in Texas that was decried as "Handmaid's Tale" or something similarly trite

We really do need to incentivize families, or we'll end up like China and Russia with their impending demographic implosions.

roflyear7• 3 years ago

Who is we here?

greggsy• 3 years ago

Australia has had a ‘baby bonus’ for about 20 years now. It’s something like $2000 now, and is intended to subsidise the costs of child rearing, and bolster the country’s fertility rate.

It received some criticism when a small number of parents were reported to have bought flat screen TVs, but that was just a politicised attack on welfare recipients, who obviously don’t deserve our hard earned tax dollars, and should continue suffering in abject destitution.

Brybry• 3 years ago

The US has had a child tax credit since 1997.[1]

And (sometimes) personal exemptions for married couples since 1913. And (sometimes) an exemption or credit for dependents since 1917. [2]

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Child_tax_credit_(United_State...

[2] https://www.nber.org/system/files/chapters/c1148/c1148.pdf [pdf]

paxys2• 3 years ago

It's going to happen. Societies around the world are going to start to realize that babies are the most valuable commodity for their continued survival, and parents will have to be incentivized well beyond the couple thousand dollars or so that is the norm today.

js8• 3 years ago

What "survival" are you talking about? There are more than 8 billion humans on Earth, more than at any point in history, in fact to the point where other ecosystems of the planet are threatened.

kevviiinn2• 3 years ago

lab hours - but you can actually get that if you really want it

Where, exactly, are you going to get wet lab experience without a degree

stainablesteel5• 3 years ago

you don't need a degree to get wet lab experience, you get it while getting the degree

you can google how to do things and buy the appropriate stuff, or find internships, its not impossible

diveandfight2• 3 years ago

Korea already provides a subsidy of ~$230/month to families with infants in their first year.

https://www.npr.org/2023/03/19/1163341684/south-korea-fertil...

LeanderK2• 3 years ago

this doesn't seem like a lot tbh. What is it afterwards? Is it expected that the woman abandons her job and only cares for the child? There are a lot of costs involved

antisthenes• 3 years ago

Laughable peanuts. What's the realistic burden of raising a child from 0 to 22 years in a developed country (including college)? $300-500k last I checked, possibly even more.

How much of that is covered by that $230 subsidy?

roflyear7• 3 years ago

i'd like to see subsidies for people to start families

Why?

stainablesteel5• 3 years ago

population collapse is a big issue for the world. in the west we've become too savvy with just importing people to offset our falling birth rate, but this is causing lower birth rates and high brain drain in the countries we source from. its a global issue

zvmaz2• 3 years ago

I wonder how the government will find out who is eligible to the allowance and who is not.

rodolphoarruda• 3 years ago

Which other countries observe this youth reclusiveness?

Uptrenda• 3 years ago

This is like trying to give someone a band-aid to stop an arterial bleed... I respect that they're trying but it won't do anything. The hikikomori phenomenon has complex causes:

- Untreated mental health problems

- Disabilities that undermine or limit social success

- Economies with few opportunities for young people

- Over-abundance of pressure (disproportionately placed on men): for academic success and career success

- Horrible housing market (why work at a crappy job only to lose what few funds you have in rent for a tiny shared apartment? Can you blame these people for not moving out?)

- Chronic loneliness (again, worse for men)

Most hikikomoris are men and when you never leave the house there's no opportunities to meet people. If you want to have the biggest effect on these people’s lives don't focus on giving them money. Unironically get them partners. No troll, young people’s social skills have declined beyond recognition and IMO as tech people we are partly to blame for this.

vasco• 3 years ago

Unironically get them partners

So how do you practically do that? Is there a state run harem for the young men you mention to get a partner? Maybe I just lack imagination but money to spend on outside activities seemed like an OK approach. What do you have in mind?

techdragon2• 3 years ago

You don’t need to be that creative to think of ways to do this without getting into “owed sex” trap.

First thing I could think of in sixty seconds: State money can sponsor singles nights with a few free drinks for every person attending courtesy of the government. Pays for responsible security and all the appropriate safety and security.

That’s just a minute thinking, I’m sure a few hours or days work could do much better. And it’s infinitely better than just giving them money directly which will likely not drive the sort of interpersonal behaviour changes they hope to sponsor since money can go directly into the things these people are already doing with their time.

1273• 3 years ago

Well, the first step would be to get both men and women disconnected from virtual stimuli like porn and social media. Satisfying ones sexual and emotional needs through the screen doesn't seem like a good thing if the goal is to make young men and women get together.

p0ckets• 3 years ago

Singapore has this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_Development_Network, although I'm not sure how successful hikikomori will be at these events...

dym_sh• 3 years ago

here's your government issued BigTittyGirlfriendGPT, and a tenga and/or bad-dragon

frereubu3• 3 years ago

This is the key question. "Get them partners" implies passivity on the part of the person who's being "got" a partner, and what about the person who's being "got"? This approach feels like a fundamental misunderstanding of human desire, and essentially a call for something akin to arranged marriages. I absolutely recognise the problem, but this seems like a terrible solution.

bsder• 3 years ago

Throw $100K cash every 5 years to a woman who stays married to her partner. Or possibly increase it every 5 years she's married to the same partner. Throw in an extra $100K every 5 years per child until child is 20.

Suddenly, you'll see a lot of women wanting to get married, stay married and have children.

Most problems can be solved with money. Most whining is because old men don't want to spend money to solve the problem.

Der_Einzige2• 3 years ago

You also forgot that their women are unapologetically not interested in the average Korean man. Because of the insane requirements put on women who marry (take care of both sets of parents and husband), most are simply refusing to date or settle down.

Their nightclubs frequently ban foreigners, ostensibly due to "risk of crime or violence" but absolutely in practice because they know that foreigners do quite well, too well in most clubs.

stametseater2• 3 years ago

90% of South Korean women have plastic surgery, but less than 5% of South Korean men do the same. Due to this, South Korean women now outclass South Korean men in attractiveness. The solution is simple; ban cosmetic surgery. Then there will be more average South Korean women to settle down with the average South Korean men.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cosmetic_surgery_in_South_Kore...

lostgame2• 3 years ago

One of the girls in my poly pod (I am both poly and lesbian), I'll call her 'Y', is South Korean and bisexual, and has repeatedly stated she'd rather die alone than to be stuck with an average Korean man. It seems like family pressure is the only reason left for South Korean women to give into the absolute shit deal that marriage is for them.

barbazoo• 3 years ago

You seem to be knowing a thing or two about this. Do you see movements among those men similar to what's happening in western societies with "incel" movements and the like, i.e. radicalization online?

didip• 3 years ago

I would reword the suggestion a bit.

"Give them a supportive social circle where making small failures are acceptable"

waboremo2• 3 years ago

Agree but with a different solution: the focus on partners is unsustainable and doesn't address a lot of the deeper rooted issues that caused their lack of socialization. It also creates a codependency, which can result in an unhealthy relationship or really devastating outcomes when the relationship ends. It basically "fixes" the problem for society but leaves individuals incredibly vulnerable.

Ideally, you would instead focus on getting them to join communities and groups. Which can be challenging, and it's also something the average person should do more. This will give them a proper support system to then take next steps on finding partners, and likely have better results from those attempts when their support system is greater than 1.

Younger people recognize this importance of community, they're joining discords they're going to meetups, they're desperately trying to connect with others but without a systemic encouragement of these groups and communities most of them struggle - the convenience of "everything online and text-based" is just too great.

Additionally, by focusing on communities over partners, you also help the average person which iirc tends to have a small friend group of around 3 people, and not at all the varied support groups we need as humans. I reckon also these friends aren't all that profound, but rather a coworker you don't mind biking with, a neighbor who likes the same sports you do, etc. This is likely also why polarization is increasing, if you don't have communities to turn to and talk things out/solve problems together, it's very easy to just start believing the most extreme takes online.

bradlys• 3 years ago

IMO as tech people we are partly to blame for this.

This was happening way before tech was taking off. This trend was already booming in the 1990s. Robert Putnam wrote his book about social capital decline before the year 2000 - way before the social media and tech explosion.

Tech is hardly the cause. Capitalism is to blame. Capitalism. Say it with me, capitalism. The further we atomize people - the more capitalism thrives. (No unions, no broader labor movements, etc.)

bluefirebrand2• 3 years ago

Tech is speeding the atomization, no question.

roundandround• 3 years ago

They don't really go into the terms of the allowance, but if use it or lose it encouraged some just to go to the movies and eat at a cafeteria a few times a week from now on, it would probably have a better effect for a lot less money than most of the attempts at social programs I have seen.

Whether it is used is probably also a helpful metric.

ogurechny6• 3 years ago

There are many accounts of people roughly defined as “NEET” having what's roughly defined as “relationships”. It doesn't change much, and doesn't automatically make life easier.

See, for example, this recent DIY audiovisual feast (with DIY machine translation that is good enough): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DIh6HjUrm9Q

Tozen7• 3 years ago

You can't simply "give them partners", because what's fueling many of the things that you described at the top is materialism, female hypergamy, cultural/social pressures, inbreeding/purity ideology (pure blood), xenophobia, etc...

Presenting a female partner won't take away her expectations (including expensive wedding fantasies and high class lifestyle), her family's expectations, expected social duties, etc...

And I will shed light on the elephant in the room, that many who have not lived in South Korea don't know about, but paying for sex is cheap and easy to find everywhere. Many such men would rather pay for sex, than be burdened with all the duties and expectations that a female partner would bring.

A significant percentage of South Korea's problem is their own xenophobia and Korean ethnic nationalism (pure blood ideology). Which goes to extremes, and is even bias against other Asians, who don't look Korean enough or are proven not to have Korean blood. Where with other countries, they can offset low birth rates, marriage partners, and their tax base with immigration, South Korea won't.

Consequently, until the mind set changes, South Korea is steadily heading towards massive population reduction. Until only a small number of the "purest" are left, and a significant number like it that way.

SMAAART• 3 years ago

IMO this will lead to an increase in hikikomori. Wait for it.

josrod• 3 years ago

I was a shut-in for a few years and lack of money is one of the biggest obstacles to get out of that situation. You want to take a welding class? You need money. You want to take an online class? You need money. Keeping friends and getting a partner without money is extremely hard as you need money to do most social things.

Despite that, I think a straight up cash allowance is the wrong approach. Only thing that helped me was getting a job so maybe some kind of jobs program would be better, in my opinion. It will help some people improve their lives so if a similar program were to be implemented where I live I wouldn't oppose but it will allow others to dig their roots even deeper into misery.

hinkley2• 3 years ago

A Korean movie was making the rounds at film festivals over a decade ago called Castaway on the Moon.

The setup: office drone gets fired, has debts, tries to jump off a bridge. He washes up on a river island, can’t get off, and decides to become a hermit. Somehow befriends a shut-in woman (she can see him from her window with a telephoto lens).

This thread reminds me of that movie (might still be on YouTube) and that this has been a known problem for some time.

ctoth• 3 years ago

I just read this a couple weeks ago, it's called The Real Reason South Koreans Aren't Having Babies. If this article is accurate, I doubt a small subsidy is going to change things. It kind of feels like the gender wars have gotten out of control over there on both sides. Worth a read at least.

[0]: The Real Reason South Koreans Aren't Having Babies: https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2023/03/south-kore...

borski• 3 years ago

We actually tried something similar when I ran Tinfoil - people worked really hard and started getting burnt out because they weren’t “getting away from it” at home.

Roughly once a month or two, we would pick a 3-day weekend (we made sure to have a 3-day holiday every month anyway) and would reimburse employees up to $80 for doing something that was “outside their norm.” Could be almost anything, but couldn’t be material (i.e. buying a video game). Nobody was forced to, of course, and if people wanted to stay home they could, but we found that folks were much more willing to get out and try something new if it was on the company dime.

Plus, then people would inevitably come back with stories to tell their colleagues, which sort of spiraled into encouraging that behavior in the future. We even ended up with an internal wiki page of ideas of “what to do” with your reimbursement weekends, all of which involved getting out and doing things outside or with other people. Not everyone participated every time, but it was definitely one of our most-beloved benefits.

whalesalad• 3 years ago

fast forward 3-4 months after stuffing that under the mattress and that is a top-tier GPU lol

sashank_1509• 3 years ago

Reading the article, and the top comments here on HN it feels like an incredible myopia people have against obvious solutions that are staring them in the face. Here’s my solution to solve social isolation, that will never be implemented in South Korea or in the current Zeitgist but will definitely work and possibly future generations will lay in shock that we did not do this (In fact we active prevented this):

Create a brotherhood organization, force every male who’s not gainfully employed to join that organization. If they don’t join they go to jail.

The fact that no one even suggests some solution in this form shows to me the irrational bias against forcing people to do stuff. Sometimes people of their own volition make bad decisions, this might be mental health or a host of other reasons. Sometimes the solution to the problem if the very thing those people are desperately avoiding and at those times, as someone who knows better, you force them to do what they don’t want and they will be happier for it.

I will be the first to admit, this solution won’t work for everyone. There is small percentage (probably as small as 0.1%) who actually don’t need constant social contact and are isolating for other reasons. They might also be geniuses (Gregory Perelman comes to mind). The rest crave social contact, probably need it much more than the average human, and they’re just not getting it because they’ve fallen into a hole and taking small steps to dig yourself out gives huge amounts of negative feedback that they would rather not try. In such a case a higher authority like the government should just force them out of their hole and they’ll thank you for it. The crazy thing is a hundred years ago, this was known everywhere. People were basically not allowed to be alone. In primitive Europe, (around 1600-1700s), if a man was seen idle he was put to work under the law. Every man till around 1900s was forced to be a part of multiple social structures, from your guild, to church, to family, to neighbour hood communities and it was often illegal to not be a part of these structures nor was it clear why one would choose to not be in these structures. Sometimes these structures were enforced by law (such as guilds) and sometimes with social pressure (such as church), but all these structures forced men to have regular contact in multiple forms, multiple times a day. Since late 1950s, most of these structures across the world have vanished and people have suffered with modern afflictions that were very rare in the past. The solutions are still the same, and giving people money, incentivizing sex etc is a bandaid not a long term solution.

soared2• 3 years ago

My favorite argument is the seatbelt argument. If car dealerships sold cars without seatbelts, but charged $1,000 to upgrade to included seatbelts - how many people would die due to it?

Your point (if we take this discussion in very very good faith and keep it theoretical) is similar - will people make the best choice for themselves, or is it better to have rules/requirements to push them towards decisions that will benefit them?

notesinthefield• 3 years ago

This is fairly reductive but isnt :

Create a brotherhood organization, force every male who’s not gainfully employed to join that organization. If they don’t join they go to jail.

more or less mandatory military conscription that I believe South Korea in particular already has?

zer0tonin• 3 years ago

And what would this brotherhood organization even do? Just let people bully each others?

simonsarris• 3 years ago

Funny enough this is close to what the Puritans did in New England. Just familyhood instead of brotherhood.

Everyone was compelled by law to live in families. Town officials would search the town for single people and, if found, order them to join a family; if they refused, they were sent to jail.

(and the average family size at the time was a little over 9 children)

Thiez3• 3 years ago

Why exactly should this law be limited to men? Put the women to work too, it would be sexist otherwise.

badpun3• 3 years ago

Communist countries did that. Except the brotherhood were state factories. If you refused to get a job (which you were guaranteed to get, as "full employment" was a core tenet of the system), you were sent to jail to wisen up.

iamnotsure• 3 years ago

When human population planning works too well.

omoikane• 3 years ago

It's interesting how "hikikomori" got into common English usage, and now this Japanese word is being used to describe South Korean youths. I would have expected Koreans to have their own word for this condition.

akiselev2• 3 years ago

It's a wonderful peak into how languages might have evolved in the past.

One day a bard is passing through some village or other and, having recently traveled to the far east, tells stories of the reclusive hikikomori of Japan. A young fella at the tavern hears the stories and is inspired to grow up to be a bard himself so he too can travel to the far east. But! He goes a little too far south and - mistaking the Yellow Sea for the Sea of Japan - swims across to the Korean peninsula bringing an invasive new word in his pocket.

seoulmetro2• 3 years ago

Obviously they do as it is just as common in South Korea as Japan. I have never heard of the word hikikomoro before. It's definitely not in common English usage at all. Otaku is what I hear in Korea. Recluse is English.

httpz• 3 years ago

Once in a while I'll see news from Korea get blown out of proportion and make it to the front page of HN when the same topic didn't even make it to the front page of Korean news.

This article made it sound like the government will just start paying loners so I had to look up some Korean sources. Apparently, S.Korean government already has a program to financially help "at-risk youths" from households below median income and either not in school or have frequent trouble with the law. The news is now saying they'll include reclusive youths in the program. The article doesn't really say the criteria to qualify but it's not like the government will handout allowances to millions of loners like the title makes it seem.

distant_hat• 3 years ago

A lot of people pooh poohing seem to think that the solution is all or nothing. All conditions have a spectrum, and maybe this would be pointless for people deep on the spectrum, it might be enough to push people on the edge to go out and socialize a bit. It will not turn them into the life of the party but maybe just give some of them a bit more social. Whether the price point is correct, or there is enough ROI on the money put in will have to be seen, but there is nothing 'obvious' that it would fail.

tatrajim• 3 years ago

Maybe some sort of required social service (beyond the required military), especially in the SK countryside where it is badly needed?

Only anecdotal, but I went from massively introverted to a more-or-less well adjusted social adult after three years in the peace corps (coincidentally in South Korea). My work in a rural health center required me daily to interact with dozens of people who needed me in a language I was struggling to learn. In the process, I grew to enjoy socializing for the first time and have benefitted from the experience ever since.

phendrenad2• 3 years ago

So they're going to help them leave the house... by paying them $490/month as long as they stay indoors. Interesting.

Now, I agree with other commenters that these recluses are probably suffering economic hardship and can't afford to flit about the city like a HBO sitcom. So I think that this welfare initiative is probably going to be a great benefit to them... but measuring how many of them leave the house is probably a bad metric, and they'll probably shut this program down once they see that the recluses remained reclusive. Oh well.

rasz• 3 years ago

Bad setup, people will take money and do nothing. Would work much better if they paid young single women to visit and talk to hikikomori.

Japan Rental Sisters: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q9IRmUEsz6g $900/month for weekly 1hour visits.

South Korea to give $490 allowance to reclusive youths to help them leave house

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