“I think the biggest takeaway from Tokyo is that when you get out of that scarcity mindset, a lot of curiosity and creative positive thinking is possible”
Prosperity is a devil's bargain. You get higher wages. But your rent goes up, your commute gets longer, and your traditional culture gets replaced by an insipid global one.
According to Joe McReynolds, this is why Tokyo deserves our attention. In a podcast with Sean Keyes, the urban studies expert and author of Emergent Tokyo explains how it is a rich, growing city with high wages and low unemployment, and seemingly immune from many of prosperity's unpleasant side effects - rents in Tokyo are about 40 per cent lower than in Dublin. McReynolds also explains how the city has managed to preserve its culture and old ways of life.
