From the Economist: "Japan shows how long the impact of a bust can linger for ordinary people":

“IT IS tough,” says Kiyoshi. As the plume of cigarette smoke dissipates, his smile exposes a single tooth. At 65, he has been homeless for six years, sleeping amid possibly hundreds of others in Ueno Park in Tokyo. At weekends they emerge from their blue tarpaulin tents (with shoes neatly placed in front, as is the Japanese custom) and queue for soup and rice.

Like many of Japan’s homeless, Kiyoshi lived a normal life during Japan’s boom years, working in a restaurant. But life became hard in the 1990s after the property and stockmarket bubble burst. He now collects empty aluminium cans to earn—“on a good day”—around ¥1,000 ($10) for food."