Karoshi means Death from Overwork in Japan

It is not a new phenomenon yet for some reason Karoshi (or death from overwork in Japan) has been in the  US media spotlight lately.

Brian Lehrer (WNYC) invited Daniel Rosenblum of the Japan Society (on July 23) to discuss the issue and the Japanese work ethic in Working to Death.

Lisa Katayama (Tokyo Mango) tells us in Restaurant Manager Dies from Overwork how 32 year old Takayuki Maezawa who started with his company at 15 died at work (October 2007) from a brain hemorrhage.

An Autoblog piece by Jeremy Korzeniewski reports that Toyota Camry hybrid lead engineer died from Karoshi (July 9). Even though this happened in 2006, it was only ruled recently as caused by overwork.

Boye Lafayette de Mente in Karoshi (pronounced: Kah-roe-she...May 2002) traces the labeling of the problem back to the late eighties and finds its cause to be "peer pressure to keep up with co-workers, out-do competing groups and increase market-share at the expense of competitors, Japanese managers are caught up in a vortex of psychological pressure that forces them to work at a frenzied pace".

There is even a Karoshi Hotline site (in both English and Japanese).

To be fair, the negative effects of overwork is not a Japanese only issue.

Investment bankers and lawyers for example log in crazy hours.

Tech workers are also prone to excessive hours. While reading on Karochi, I remembered Defying Gravity: The Making of Newton (a coffee table book by Markos Kounalakis) which gives us some disturbing accounts of how some people working on the Apple Newton went into a meltdown.

No sweets for Tokyo Thursdays #48

Loosely linked: A Whole New Manga...Daniel Pink goes Graphic with Johnny Who? Johnny Bunko