The Japan Labor Flash No.57
Email Journal March 15, 2006
Statistical Reports
Recent Statistical Survey Reports
Current Topics
Female Employees in their 30s and 40s with Children Show Strong
Will to Continue Working
Many Complaints of "Disparity" Made on JCUF Hotline for Non-Regular
workers
Public Policies
A Package of Bills related to Medical Care Reform Submitted to
the Diet
129 National Civil Servants Recruited via Levels II and III Exams
Promoted to Higher-Ranking Posts in FY2004
News Clippings
Full-Scale Seniority System to be Applied to Corporate Employees
until their 10th Year
Business Recovery and Mass Retirement of Baby-Boomers Lead to
Scrambling for Personnel
Special Issue
The "Ideal" Lifestyle
Statistical Reports
-Recent Statistical Survey Reports February 2006-
Features
Report on Employment Service (January)
Labor Force Survey : Detailed Tabulation
http://www.jil.go.jp/english/estatis/esaikin/2006/e2006-02.htm
Current Topics
-Female Employees in their 30s and 40s with Children Show Strong
Will to Continue Working-
In late February, Nomura Research Institute Ltd. published the
findings of a questionnaire survey on corporate schemes for supporting
child-rearing. The survey, conducted in January 2006, was addressed
to 1,000 people across the country who work for private firms and
have children in the third year of primary school or younger. The
survey found that quite a few female employees in their 30s and 40s
with small children responded that they would give priority to child
-rearing, but also found that they were in fact very keen to keep
working.
Both male and female respondents expressed great expectations of
corporate schemes for supporting child-rearing; a large number of
them would like their companies to have schemes for (paid) leave
to tend sick children, (paid) leave for men when their spouses give
birth, and shorter working hours for the sake of child-rearing.
Respondents also expressed great dissatisfaction with the schemes
of their own companies as being theoretically available but difficult
to use in practice.
-Many Complaints of "Disparity" Made on JCUF Hotline for Non-Regular
Workers-
The Japan Community Union Federation (JCUF) tracked the usage of
a "Hotline for non-regular workers," such as part-time and dispatched
workers, which was made available on February 2-4, 2006. The service
was used by 307 people across the country (of whom non-regular workers
numbered 235), and the matters on which advice was sought concerned
dismissals (including dismissals due to the termination of contract
terms), wages, unpaid overtime, and violation of the minimum wage law,
among others. An exceptionally large number of complaints made on the
Hotline were, for example, that non-regular workers were paid only
one-third of the wages of regular employees who had identical jobs;
they had neither paid holidays nor retirement allowances; and they
were obliged to accept termination of their employment contracts after
only three to six months due to unjustifiable application of the
regulations on limited contract terms.
Public Policies
-A Package of Bills related to Medical Care Reform Submitted to
the Diet-
At a Cabinet meeting on February 10, the government adopted a package
of bills related to a medical care reform plan (including a bill for
partial amendment of the Health Insurance Law), and submitted it to
the Diet. The government has explained that the revision will contribute
to the future sustainability and stability of the health care system.
In particular, the bills provide for a health care program for the
elderly, financed by insurance payments by people aged 75 and above,
to be established in fiscal year 2008; the burden of the elderly is
being increased or revised to trim health-care spending, which has
been increasing as the ageing of society advances.
This prompted Nippon Keidanren (the Japan Business Federation),
Rengo (the Japanese Trade Union Confederation) and Kenporen (the
National Federation of Health Insurance Societies) to confirm jointly
on February 14 the result of a discussion about the new bills; they
have called for prompt reconsideration of the program, which they
fear might not be sustainable. The three organizations have also
jointly requested revision of the program stating that any new program
must win the confidence of the younger, working generation who will
have to support it.
-129 National Civil Servants Recruited via Levels II and III Exams
Promoted to Higher-Ranking Posts in FY2004 -
On February 24, the National Personnel Authority published information
that they had gathered on steps taken by individual government offices
and ministries during fiscal 2004 regarding the promotion to high-level
posts of national civil servants recruited through the level II and
III examinations. The number of those promoted to posts in designated
services or managerial posts totaled 129 (in 40 organizations),
outnumbering the figure for the previous fiscal year, 112 (in 32
organizations), but still remaining quite small.
News Clippings
-Full-Scale Seniority System to be Applied to Corporate Employees
until their 10th Year-
Sumitomo Corporation is to revise its personnel management system
drastically for the first time in six years. Under the new, full-scale
seniority system, newly graduated employees joining the company in
April this year will be treated exactly the same in terms of wages
and promotion. After ten years, they will be promoted to managerial
posts simultaneously, but the seniority system will cease to apply
to them, which means they will qualify for different grades according
to their abilities and the degree of importance of their assignments.
Some may even be downgraded at that point. On the other hand, once
they are qualified as managers, they will be subject to a new
comprehensive performance-based system which will differentiate
them considerably more than the current one. The aim is to incorporate
a clear-cut, well-disciplined strategy - seniority-based for young
employees and merit-based for middle-standing ones - into personnel
management. Evaluations of the development of each employee's ability,
which will be posted in the workplace to encourage their sense of
commitment, will be reflected in bonus payments only.
Among moves to revise the advanced performance- and merit-based
personnel management systems, Citizen Watch Co., Ltd., which at one
stage started to apply an annual salary system to newly hired
employees, gave it up in part and virtually restored the seniority
-based wage system by allowing employees, from fiscal year 2005,
to choose between the annual salary system and the traditional wage
system based on skill grades.
Now that the economy is recovering and corporate performance has
improved, firms have some breathing room. It is expected that the
move taken by Sumitomo - implementing a seniority-based system
uniformly applied (up to a certain point) to young employees with
potential to become great assets - will be followed by other firms
in future.
(Nikkei Shimbun, March)
-Business Recovery and Mass Retirement of Baby-Boomers Lead to
Scrambling for Personnel-
It seems that leading companies will substantially increase the
hiring of new graduates in spring 2007. With a break from deflation
in sight, firms have begun to draw up their strategies for growth
and need the additional staff in their production, sales and other
divisions. The move towards personnel expansion is also attributable
to the mass reduction in the workforce during the recession and the
"year 2007 problem."
"Since we shed the workforce via closures of factories and voluntary
retirement when we undertook corporate restructuring steps, we now
need to make up for the shortage," Nissan Motor Co., Ltd. explains.
Mizuho Financial Group, Inc., on the other hand, increased the
proportion of females in new hiring as a whole from 10 percent in
spring 2005 to 20 percent this spring.
The revised Law concerning Stabilization of Employment of Older
Persons will take effect this April, and firms will be required to
continue, though gradually, hiring workers who have reached the
mandatory retirement age. Some firms, in fact, have already taken
advantage of the scheme stipulated by the revised law. Mitsui
Chemicals, Inc. will re-hire almost all employees who, in fiscal year
2006, are about to leave the company at their mandatory retirement
age but wish to be re-employed. The employees to be rehired account
for approximately 60 percent of all retiring workers.
The Japan Research Institute, Ltd. says that, in future, firms will
hire a small number of highly competitive new graduates and will make
up for the shortage with various types of workers such as the elderly,
women, and in some cases foreigners.
(Yomiuri Shimbun, March)
Special Issue
-The "Ideal" Lifestyle-
In present-day Japan, about 10 percent of the total population
resides in Tokyo, and the disparities between large cities and rural
areas are seen as a problem. In other words, quite a few rural areas
are suffering from depopulation and losing their vitality.
The government is seriously aware of the necessity for strategies
to address such disparities. In November and December 2005, the
Cabinet Office conducted an opinion poll on the relationship between
and coexistence of cities and rural areas, addressed to 3,000 people
aged 20 and above across the country. Effective returns totaled 1,746.
The results of the poll, published in February 2006, are full of
indicative, interesting data which allow us to envisage how the modern
Japanese manage to work and live.
Continued on;
http://www.jil.go.jp/english/archives/emm/2003/no.57/57_si.html
