As the pandemic lingers, the problem of "hidden unemployment," where many unemployed are not reflected in the total unemployment rates the government announces, has become more serious. There has been a rapid rise of absentees (people with employment contracts but no work), and it has been found that many people are working less than half the hours they did before the pandemic at part-time jobs. The employment environment for women, who account for a high percentage of non-regular workers, has particularly deteriorated, and the government's support measures have not reached far enough.
-- "Trick" of statistics
The seasonally adjusted total unemployment rate in January was 2.9%, down 0.1 percentage point from December and dropping to the 2% level for the first time in six months, according to the Labor Force Survey conducted by the Internal Affairs and Communications Ministry. Since last spring, the unemployment rate has hovered around 3% -- lower than the rate after the collapse of U.S. investment bank Lehman Brothers, when it temporarily rose to the 5% level.
However, even if people are not working, they may not be included in the "totally unemployed" category because if their employment contracts are valid, they are categorized as absentees in government statistics. Those considered absentees in January increased by 500,000 from the same month last year to 2.44 million, with many of them in the accommodation and food services industries, which has been hit hard by the restraints on business hours and people going out less.
A 24-year-old man in Tokyo, who works part-time at an event company managing equipment, used to work five days a week and earned about 200,000 yen a month before the pandemic. He has been without work since April last year. He said when he told the company the days he could work, he was simply told that "full-time employees are also on standby at home."
There have been significantly more absentees while those considered unemployed has not increased because companies are concerned they will suffer labor shortages after the coronavirus is contained. Restaurants were facing a serious labor shortage before the pandemic. The airline industry, which has seen a sharp decline in passengers, is maintaining employment.
"If we do not have human resources when demand returns, we will not be able to recover our business performance," said a major airline executive.
-- 1.47 million virtually unemployed
There are other cases not reflected in the government statistics. The Nomura Research Institute, Ltd. conducted a survey on the actual situation of many part-time workers, who are now working fewer hours and earning less money, which is making their lives more difficult. It estimated that as of February, about 1.47 million people were "virtually unemployed," or working less than half the hours they did before the pandemic and receiving no leave allowance.
If people work even for a short time, they are not included in categories such as unemployed in government statistics. However, for those who work on an hourly basis, a decrease in working hours directly leads to a decrease in income.
This has had a serious impact on women. About 70% of the "virtually unemployed," or 1.03 million people, are women, more than double the number of men at 430,000. There was already a high percentage of women among workers in the wholesale, retail, accommodation and restaurant industries before the coronavirus disaster, and these industries were hit hard by the pandemic.
The average number of women in the workforce was 29.68 million in 2020, an increase of more than 3 million over the past 10 years. However, 54.4% of them were in non-regular employment, much higher than the percentage of men at 22.1%.
-- Benefits not being used
The government has established special measures for employment adjustment subsidies, or subsidizing part of the absence allowance paid by companies to their employees. As there are some cases where employers do not pay leave benefits due to complicated procedures, the government also introduced another benefit that workers can apply themselves. This benefit also covers cases in which working hours are reduced.
However, of the 544.2 billion yen earmarked for the programs, only 14%, or 77.6 billion yen, has been approved for payment as of Feb. 25. A representative of the Shutoken Seinen Union, a labor union mainly of young people, said the programs have not been widely recognized.
"We need to provide detailed information to ensure support is delivered to those who need it," said Kana Takeda, a senior consultant at the Nomura Research Institute.
--Non-regular employees account for 40% of Japan workforce
By Tomoki Okamoto / Yomiuri Shimbun Staff Writer
Nearly 40% of all workers in Japan are employed on non-regular contracts, a designation which includes part-time and temporary staff.
While non-regular contracts provide a certain degree of flexibility that allows workers to choose employment that suits their own lifestyles, the system makes it difficult for employers to invest in their human resources and cultivate skills in the long run, and non-regular employees are in a lower wage bracket than regular-contract employees.
Non-regular contract employment increased in the 1990s after Japan's bubble economy went bust. In the "employment ice age" that followed, many companies struggling with deteriorating bottom lines reduced the number of new regular-contract hires, leaving a large segment of young people no choice but to accept part-time or temporary staff jobs.
In 1999, a revision to the Law for Securing the Proper Operation of Worker Dispatching Undertakings and Improved Working Conditions for Dispatched Workers was enacted to give companies more operational leeway.
The government lifted restrictions on "haken" temporary work, which had previously been limited to a specific set of industries, signaling a shift that, in principle, liberalized the market for dispatched workers. In 2004, the temporary worker category was further expanded to include the manufacturing industry.
The large demographic of non-regular employees was exacerbated by the financial crisis induced by so-called "Lehman shock" in 2008.
Facing failing corporate performance, many companies, particularly manufacturers, purged their non-regular employees in a wave of layoffs that became a problematic social phenomenon.
In his second term as prime minister, which began at the end of 2012, Shinzo Abe rolled out a package of economic strategies that came to be dubbed "Abenomics." The policies helped stimulate economic recovery and hiring, leading to an increase in the number of non-regular contract jobs, primarily those held be women. By 2019, the number of female non-regular contract workers had risen by more than 2 million.
However, the job climate has taken a dramatic turn amid the novel coronavirus crisis.
While the number of regular contract positions has continued to hover around the 35 million mark, essentially unchanged from before the coronavirus crisis, the number of non-regular contract jobs fell by 1.21 million, from 21.79 million as of December 2019 to 20.58 million in January this year.
Going forward, the question will be how to cultivate talent in order to increase the number of workers in industries related to digital tech, a sector which is expected to show promising growth.
Read more from The Japan News at https://japannews.yomiuri.co.jp/
