｜Caregiving is not simply a family matter.
It can change your career, your finances, your future—and ultimately, your entire life.
Recently, I learned about a Japanese film called Snowdrop, based on the 2015 Tonegawa Family Tragedy in Fukaya, Saitama.
The story stayed with me.
An elderly couple and their third daughter were living under severe financial and caregiving pressures. The parents eventually died, while their daughter survived and was later convicted of murder and assisted suicide. She was sentenced to four years in prison.
When I first learned about this case, I found myself thinking:
How could something like this happen?
And then I realized something uncomfortable.
If I had not experienced caregiving myself, I might have looked at this story from a distance and thought:
“They brought it upon themselves.”
But I can no longer see it that way.
｜We Are No Longer Standing on the Other Side of the Tonegawa Family Tragedy
We are no longer standing on the other side of the Tonegawa family tragedy.
The circumstances that led to that tragedy are not necessarily someone else’s problem.
They can happen inside an ordinary family.
A parent develops dementia.
A parent becomes physically dependent.
Medical expenses increase.
Caregiving takes up more and more time.
Someone has to leave work.
Income falls.
Savings begin to disappear.
And little by little, the family can find itself trapped in a situation that once seemed unimaginable.
This is not a story about one particular family.
It is a story about the society we are living in.
｜The Reality of Japan’s Pension System
Even after working for decades, retirement does not necessarily mean financial security.
According to Japan’s Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare, the average monthly pension payment at the end of fiscal 2024 was approximately:
| Pension | Average Monthly Amount | Approx. Annual Amount |
|---|---|---|
| National Pension | ¥59,310 | ¥711,720 |
| Employees’ Pension | ¥150,289 | ¥1,803,468 |
These are averages, of course. Individual pension amounts vary significantly depending on employment history, contribution history, income, and other factors.
But the numbers still raise an important question:
How far can an ordinary pension stretch when aging, illness, and caregiving enter the picture?
My own family has made me think about this question in very concrete terms.
My father worked for a major Japanese corporation for many years and retired from a management position.
Even with a pension, however, retirement does not mean that every expense disappears.
Taxes remain.
Healthcare costs remain.
Daily living expenses remain.
And then there is caregiving.
｜Caregiving Is Expensive
My mother and father have different levels of cost-sharing under Japan’s long-term care insurance system.
For my mother, the copayment is 10%.
For my father, it is 30%.
Even a short stay at a care facility can become surprisingly expensive.
In our case, a three-day short-stay arrangement cost approximately:
- Mother: about ¥8,000 per day
- Father: about ¥24,000 per day
For three days, that came to approximately ¥96,000 in total.
Ninety-six thousand yen.
For just three days.
That is more than what my family might spend on a two-night, three-day hot-spring trip.
Of course, costs vary depending on the facility, services used, care level, location, and individual circumstances.
But the experience made one thing very clear to me:
Caregiving is not an abstract social issue. It is a financial reality.
And if someone eventually needs a residential care facility, the financial burden can become even greater.
Depending on the facility and circumstances, monthly costs can reach ¥250,000–¥300,000 or more per person.
If both parents require such care, the household burden could potentially reach several hundred thousand yen per month.
That is a completely different scale of financial pressure.
｜What Happens When Caregiving Forces Someone Out of Work?
This is where the problem becomes even more serious.
Because caregiving does not only cost money.
It can cost someone their career.
Even after building a career for many years, losing your job because of caregiving can change your life overnight.
My childhood friend experienced exactly this.
When her parents needed care, she was forced to leave her full-time job.
During the day, she cared for her father.
After he fell asleep, she worked at night.
Read that again.
She was caregiving during the day and working at night.
This is what caregiving can look like in real life.
And it is not necessarily a temporary inconvenience.
Leaving a full-time position can lead to lower income.
Lower income can mean lower social-insurance contributions.
That can eventually affect retirement security.
A temporary caregiving crisis can therefore create a financial problem that continues long after the caregiving itself has ended.
｜Caregiving Can Create a Chain Reaction
This is one of the aspects of caregiving that concerns me most.
The chain can look like this:
Caregiving → Leaving work → Lower income → Reduced career opportunities → Lower pension → Financial insecurity
One problem creates another.
And another.
And another.
For someone who has already spent years working in a non-regular position, the consequences can be even more severe.
For someone who has been out of the workforce for several years, returning can also become difficult.
And for people who are already approaching retirement age, there may be very little time to rebuild their careers or savings.
This is why I do not believe caregiving should be discussed simply as a private family matter.
It is deeply connected to employment, pensions, social security, poverty, gender, and the future of Japan’s aging population.
｜The Generation That Grew Up Believing in Stable Employment
My parents belong to a generation with a very different experience of work.
My father’s generation lived through the Tokyo air raids, evacuation, postwar poverty, and the era when American soldiers would hand out chocolate and candy to children.
He started working when his monthly salary was only around ¥30,000.
Then came Japan’s period of rapid economic growth.
He worked through it.
He built a career.
He became a manager.
For his generation, the traditional model was relatively straightforward:
Work → Build a career → Retire → Receive a pension
But that model is becoming increasingly difficult to maintain.
｜What About the Lost Generation?
Japan’s so-called Employment Ice Age Generation entered the workforce during a period when stable employment opportunities were severely limited.
Many experienced non-regular employment, unstable career paths, repeated job changes, or long periods outside the workforce.
Now, many members of this generation are approaching middle and older age.
And some are simultaneously facing another responsibility:
Caring for aging parents.
This creates a particularly difficult combination.
A person who has already experienced unstable employment may suddenly have to choose between:
working and caring for a parent.
And if they leave work, they may lose not only today’s income, but also part of tomorrow’s financial security.
｜Japan’s Caregiving Problem Is Much Bigger Than One Number
The scale of this issue becomes clearer when we look at different statistics.
According to Japan’s 2022 Employment Status Survey, approximately 106,000 people left their previous jobs during the preceding year because of caregiving or nursing responsibilities.
Of those, approximately 83,000 were no longer employed afterward, while approximately 23,000 continued working.
Women accounted for roughly 80,000 of the people who left work for caregiving or nursing reasons.
There is another statistic worth noting.
In the 2025 Labour Force Survey, approximately 140,000 people who wanted to work were outside the labor force and cited caregiving or nursing as the reason they were not seeking employment.
These statistics measure different populations and should not simply be added together.
But together, they reveal something important:
Caregiving can push people out of the workforce—and keep them out.
And that has consequences for both individuals and society.
｜This Problem Does Not Exist in Isolation
Caregiving intersects with many other social issues:
- Low pension income
- Older people living alone
- Poverty among older adults
- Public assistance
- Young carers
- The “8050” problem
- Women’s career interruptions
- The social-insurance income threshold
- Older people caring for even older parents or spouses
- Shortages of care facilities
- Shortages of professional caregivers
- Student-loan burdens
- Long-term unemployment
- Non-regular employment
These are not separate problems floating independently in society.
They can overlap.
One family can experience several of them at the same time.
That is when a personal problem can become a social crisis.
｜What Happens When the Family Can No Longer Carry the Burden?
This is the question I keep coming back to.
What happens when a family has done everything it can?
What happens when the children are working?
What happens when they have their own financial responsibilities?
What happens when a parent develops dementia?
What happens when caregiving continues for years?
What happens when savings begin to disappear?
And what happens when the caregiver finally has to say:
“I can’t do this anymore.”
The answer cannot simply be:
“Family should take care of family.”
Because families have limits.
Time has limits.
Money has limits.
Human beings have limits.
｜What Kind of Society Are We Creating?
I recently heard someone say:
“This country has plenty of people who want to be politicians, but not enough people who act like true statesmen.”
Whether or not one agrees with that statement, it reflects a frustration that many people feel when they look at the gap between everyday life and public policy.
I have also heard concerns raised by medical professionals about the difficulty of ensuring that people who genuinely need assistance can actually receive it.
At the same time, claims about foreigners, public assistance, or unpaid social-insurance premiums are often discussed emotionally and sometimes without sufficient distinction between verified data, estimates, and individual anecdotes.
That is precisely why these issues need to be examined carefully.
For example, discussions about unpaid National Health Insurance premiums among foreign residents have included estimates in the hundreds of billions of yen.
But estimates based on selected municipal data or assumptions should not be presented as though they were confirmed nationwide totals.
The same applies to public assistance.
Japan’s Public Assistance Act does not provide foreign nationals with the same statutory right to public assistance as Japanese citizens. However, based on a 1954 Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare notice, administrative assistance has been provided by analogy to certain categories of foreign residents.
According to Ministry data, households headed by non-Japanese nationals represented a small proportion of households receiving public assistance.
These distinctions matter.
If we want to discuss social security fairly, we need facts—not assumptions.
｜The Real Question Is Not “Who Deserves Help?”
Perhaps the deeper question is:
What kind of social system do we want to build for an aging society?
A system in which families are expected to absorb every crisis privately?
Or a system in which families, communities, professionals, and public institutions share responsibility?
There is no simple answer.
And there is no single policy that can solve everything.
But ignoring the problem will not make it disappear.
Japan’s population is aging.
The number of people requiring care will remain a major social concern.
And the people providing that care are also aging.
This means that the traditional assumption—
“The family will take care of it.”
—cannot be treated as an unlimited resource.
｜One Day, This Could Be Your Family
The most frightening thing about caregiving is not that it happens to other people.
It is that it can happen to any ordinary family.
A parent who is healthy today may develop dementia tomorrow.
A spouse who is independent today may suddenly need extensive care.
A child who has a stable career today may find themselves unable to continue working.
And a family that believes it has enough savings may discover that long-term care costs far more than expected.
That is why the Tonegawa family tragedy stayed with me.
Not because their circumstances were identical to mine.
They were not.
But because I could finally see the distance between their story and mine shrinking.
We are no longer standing on the other side of the Tonegawa family tragedy.
We are living in the same aging society.
And that means we need to pay attention.
｜Caregiving Is Not a Failure of Love
I used to think of caregiving primarily as an expression of love.
And in many ways, it is.
But love alone cannot pay for care.
Love cannot replace a lost salary.
Love cannot restore a disrupted career.
Love cannot guarantee a pension.
And love cannot make a human being limitless.
Family love matters.
But family love should not be expected to carry the entire weight of a social system.
That is where society comes in.
｜Reclaiming Quality of Life
This is why caregiving has become one of the central themes of my life—and of Kanna’s Quality of Life.
Quality of Life is not simply about living longer.
It is about being able to Discover. Savor. Live with Grace.
Even in difficult circumstances.
Even when life does not go according to plan.
And perhaps especially when we are forced to confront realities we never expected.
Caregiving has made me look differently at aging.
At work.
At money.
At family.
At social security.
And at what it truly means to live with dignity.
The Tonegawa family tragedy is not simply a story from the past.
It is a warning about how quickly an ordinary family can become overwhelmed when multiple pressures collide.
The question is not whether we love our families enough.
The question is whether our society is prepared to support people before they reach the point of collapse.
Because caregiving should never have to mean losing your entire life.
Family love alone cannot sustain a society.
We need systems that allow people to care for the people they love—
without losing themselves in the process.
And perhaps that is where a society’s true Quality of Life begins.
