Man, this hurts to read. Japan's alcohol culture was already bad to begin with and now this. With the overabundance of vending machines and convenience stores, you will never have a hard time of finding booze in Japan. Also, in some companies, it's even expected for employees to go out for drinks after work. And now the government is flat-out asking people to drink more. This can't end well.
Right??? Isn't this the same country where people not only work for like 14 hours straight but are expected to join their coworkers and get fucking wasted after? Am I confusing South Korea and Japan?
As I understand it, South Koreans have similar problems with drinking, so even if you are confusing the two, you would have good reason to.
Yup here in South Korea it's very similar culture wise, but we definitely don't need the government encouraging it more since it never fell off.
Anecdotally, friend of mine today proudly proclaimed that she had been to the same bar almost every day for the past 2 years.