At this point, the shockingly low wages for Japanese anime creators is so well documented that change has to be around the corner. It surely can't come soon enough for Taiki Nishimura, a technical director with 20 years of experience. He revealed on Twitter that on average, he earns about ¥100,000 yen a month for whatever anime project he's currently working on. That converts to about $900 USD.
However, his cost of living, for just basic necessities, is about ¥150,000 yen (US$1,350) to ¥200,000 yen (US$1,800) according to Nishimura. That means he has to work on two anime at once, something that leaves him with virtually zero free time.
Here's some other articles we've previously written which further illuminate the state of the anime industry in Japan.