“Middle-aged virgins,” men whose only sexual activity is onanism, are being highlighted as a major problem in Japanese society, with their numbers burgeoning even as youthful sexual activity increases, creating a “sexual bipolarisation.”
Some data indicates as many as 24.3% of males aged 30-35 are virgins, a statistic which seems to have been worsening, and these men are overwhelmingly poor, leading some to suggest female expectations play a role.
It seems that although the average age of a Japanese person’s sexual experience continues to decrease, at the same time a “sex divide” is ensuring some men remain isolated from the company of women, writes economist and author Takashi Kadokura.
Typically, sexual encounters at school are said to be ones where the female takes no great interest in income or prospects, but once into college and the workplace Japanese women suddenly become much more concerned about a partner’s potential as a source of income, the so-called “three highs”: high height, high academic qualifications, and high income.
A small-scale survey supports this notion: 73.9% of those with annual incomes of less than $20,000 had no partners, whilst only 33.3% of men with incomes of from $90-120,000 lacked partners.
The same survey suggested these poorer men could or would not use prostitutes; 85.5% of the below $20,000 group had never used a brothel, whilst only 37% of men with incomes from $90,000 to $120,000 had never visited such an establishment, itself a rather disturbing figure.
These poorer men are increasingly freeters and NEETs, and with their incomes generally remaining low throughout their lives, rather than peaking in their 40s and 50s as with regular salarymen, Japan may be forming a virgin underclass whose only access to sex and female companionship is through AV and ero-manga.
On the other hand, one of the many such surveys of single women found that the “cut-off line” for marriage for 46% of women was $40,000 a year, with 29% demanding $60,000.
However, 2007 government statistics indicated there are only 2,544,900 employed bachelor men with incomes over $40,000 in the whole country, meaning millions of “excess” women are present hunting for the tiny number of high-income men they consider eligible, whilst the rest are left with only the prospect of fantasies.
The obvious inference is that the major reason the poorer, average men are unable to find partners is because Japanese women are busy chasing dreams of wedding the handful of men with high incomes…
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