日本的“外国人问题”叙事已成为政治焦点，但数据表明症结在于外国人太少：外国人约占日本人口的3%，而经合组织（OECD）平均为15%。与此同时，日本人口预计到2070年将减少30%，降至8700万。

自2010年以来，日本的外国居民人数翻了一番，达到370万；外国游客人数在同一时期增加到原来的四倍，去年约达4000万。由于多数移民依赖临时工作签证，融合被削弱，而当主流政治人物回避公开讨论这些变化时，民粹叙事更容易将其描绘为“无声入侵”。

政府提出对逾期居留进行打击、对游客征税、限制购房并设定外劳上限，相关方案可能在本月晚些时候推出，但这与劳动力现实相冲突。日本在酒店业、农业和护理等行业已依赖外国人，而遏制旅游则会压制日本仅次于汽车的第二大出口，因此更有效的做法是将游客引导至非热门地区，并建立能吸引并筛选技能型新来者、促进其融入且确保其公平分担医疗与福利成本的移民制度。

Japan’s “foreigner problem” has become a political focal point, but the numbers point to too few foreigners: foreigners are about 3% of Japan’s population versus an OECD average of 15%. Meanwhile, Japan’s population is projected to fall 30% to 87 million by 2070.

Since 2010, the number of foreign residents has doubled to 3.7 million; over the same period, foreign visitors have risen fourfold to about 40 million last year. Because most migration runs through temporary work visas, integration is held back, and when mainstream politicians avoid frank discussion of these shifts, populist narratives more easily cast them as a “silent invasion.”

Proposed measures include crackdowns on visa overstays, tourist taxes, property-purchase restrictions, and caps on foreign labor, with a package possibly due later this month, but they collide with labor-market reality. Japan already relies on foreigners in hospitality, farming, and nursing, and curbing tourism would squeeze its second-largest export after cars, so a better approach is to spread visitors beyond hotspots and build an immigration system that attracts and selects skilled newcomers, integrates them, and ensures they fairly share health-care and welfare costs.

Source: Does Japan have a “foreigner problem”?

Subtitle: Yes—but it is not what populist politicians say it is

Dateline: 1月 08, 2026 05:48 上午