In a nation with a crippled economy you’d imagine that every person would be working in a productive job, trying to improve upon the economical status of the country. In Japan there exists a government debt equal to 130% of the nation's GDP, a stock market near its lowest point since 1983, and a banking system that is extremely weighed down by bad loans, so you would imagine that they’d try to put people in meaningful, productive jobs that would get the country back on its feet.

But this isn’t the case. Japan is home to some of the most useless occupations imaginable. The following is a list of some of those jobs, which take away from the work force and productivity of the nation.

Crossing Guards

In many of Japan's cities you can find crossing guards standing at every street. Not only at uncontrolled intersections but also intersections that have traffic lights or stop signs as well. They are completely useless by themselves, but they also have negative effects, as they will sometimes not allow people to cross the street even if no cars are present.

Elevator Girls

Just in case you have trouble pushing an elevator button there is a woman who will push it for you. You’d imagine that people could handle the operation of an elevator on their own, but some department stores and banks want to help you out with it. It seems that the only real purpose of the elevator girl is to bow, as a study done indicated that the average elevator girl bows more than 2,500 times a day.

Museum Ladies

These ladies are perhaps the most interesting and useless people of all. In every room of every main museum in Japan these ladies sit in a chair acting as human scarecrows. They don’t talk, they don’t move, and they don’t even have any information about the exhibits around them. To add more mystery to the museum ladies they all have small black blankets, which they lay over their laps. Spooky.

Electronics Store Workers

Although they are known to be extremely polite and willing to help out in any way, electronics store workers unfortunately know nothing about the products in their store. Especially in computer stores, where many of the workers don’t even own their own computer, they are completely baffled at the simplest of questions.

Construction Equipment Depot Guards

Similar to the crossing guards, but at the same time very different. Early in the morning construction crews will leave with their equipment for a hard days work on the job and this is when the depot guard takes his place in the front of the building to guard the empty storage lot, posing as a director of equipment. This guard, dressed in the brightest blue jumpsuit imaginable, simply sits in a fold out chair for the seven hours while construction crews are out working.

Even though these jobs are very inefficient they can be looked at as useful in a way. Many of the jobs are given to retired elderly people who do not have enough money from pension to live on. These jobs help to give them some extra money in their pockets, and give them a sense of dignity, which can be helpful to boost morale.