On 05/29/2010 01:55 AM, Declan Murphy wrote:
> On May 28, 8:59 pm, "John W."<worthj1...@gmail.com>  wrote:
>> On May 27, 7:58 pm, CL<flot...@yahoo.com>  wrote:
>>
>>> Tokyo-to, Ota-ku ... JPY480,000 ... in cash.  One time.  And they also
>>> reimbursed the JPY400,000 for the basic hospital stay fee upon
>>> presentation of the checkout paperwork.  Of course, the family Human
>>> Being _did_ handle the paperwork.  The Animal just followed along behind
>>> and pushed the stroller.
>>
>> I didn't know it was so profitable; my BYJW would have probalby gone
>> home to have the baby had she known about this; that'd more than cover
>> airfare.
>>
>> John W.
>
> I'm so (blissfully) ignorant about this, that I don't even know if it
> varies from prefecture to prefecture (or city!?).

Definitely differs from jurisdiction to jurisdiction.  The nice part 
about living in Ota-ku was that it has Haneda Airport and is the home 
address of the headquarters for a number of major corporations and/or 
had major factories that produced huge tax income.  That, plus 
containing Denenchofu and Kaminoge which are supposed to have the 
highest per capita incomes in Kanto.  They've had a budget surplus for 
the past 50-odd years (the only municipality in the country, they say). 
  The tax bite for personal income was about 2% lower than adjoining -ku 
when we lived there.  The deduction for health care is (or was) lowest 
in Japan and, if you have a disability, the bennies are far better than 
any of the rest of the 23-ku. Stuff like discounts on road tolls (half 
price, nationwide, but you need ETC to get the discount), free passes 
for buses and trains, taxi coupons, if you need to get to a hospital 
regularly and there are no bus routes within some fixed distance.  The 
family also gets paid transportation to go visit a family member when 
they're hospitalized.

Of course, the downside is that, depending on where you live, you may 
have to deal with the remains of chrome shops, buried factory waste, 
chemical waste in the water supply and aircraft falling out of the sky. 
  Or, you can live up on one of the hills and, whenever there's an 
earthquake, you can watch the lowlands shake and dance, reminding you 
that you're on an old island and they're built on a dried out beach.

-- 
CL