The national poverty rate stood at 15.7 percent in 2006, according to first-ever figures released Tuesday by the Health, Labor and Welfare Ministry, a fairly high rate for a developed country.
The poverty rate for children was 14.2 percent that year, the ministry said. The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development defines households with less than half the median national disposable income as poor. For Japan it was ¥1.14 million in 2006.
The OECD has published the poverty rates for member countries through 2004, but the Japanese government had not previously calculated the rate.
The rate in Japan “is quite high among the OECD countries,” welfare minister Akira Nagatsuma said at a news conference.
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Japan Govt’s Poverty Data Signals Policy Shift
It’s hard to imagine that there would be much hand-wringing in Japan over poverty figures. After all, this is the market where many of the world’s top luxury brands were making a killing before the Great Recession hit. Most Japanese consider themselves to be middle class—more than 80%, if you believe the Cabinet Office’s annual lifestyle survey, released in August. In a country where corporate chieftains’ salaries pale in comparison to U.S. CEOs, the relatively narrow gap between the haves and have-nots had long been a source of pride.
So why is the media making such a big deal of the Health, Labor and Welfare Ministry’s release of national poverty figures today?
One reason: It shows that Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama is serious about his pledge to put consumers before big businesses. “The government is making the plight of consumers a top priority,” Hisa Anan, secretary-general of Consumers Japan, a national network of non-profit groups, told me. “We hope they continue to follow through.”
No Japanese prime minister had ever authorized a poverty survey before. In the past, Japan had always deferred to OECD statistics. It’s not clear why: Japan could simply have teased out the figures from its National Livelihood Survey.
There was nothing shocking about the ministry’s figures. They showed that Japan’s relative poverty rate edged up from 14.6% in 1998 to 15.7% in 2007. That number is the percentage of the population that lives on less than of the country’s median annual income of just over $25,000—or about $12,500. (Child poverty had increased went up, too, from 13.4% to 14.2%.)
But, apparently, publishing poverty data would have meant that Japan had a problem.
Earlier this month, Health, Labor and Welfare Minister Akira Nagatsuma focused national attention on poverty when he promised to survey the country’s so-called waakingu poa (or, working poor)–people who scratch by on every paycheck working part-time or minimum-wage jobs. It’s hard to fix a problem that you won’t acknowledge. The DPJ-led government was effectively admitting it had a problem.
The OECD had already ranked Japan’s poverty level fourth highest among wealthy nations. But there was one point of disagreement: In its October 2008 report (titled “Growing Unequal? Income Distribution and Poverty in OECD Countries”), the OECD found that while household incomes in Japan had declined over the past decade, income inequality and poverty were less of a problem than they were five years ago.
In recent years, ordinary Japanese have had plenty to worry about. Unemployment has risen to near record levels. The country’s so-called lost decade of no growth had forced many people to seek short-term contract work or low-paying part-time and temp jobs. And companies blindsided by the global financial crisis and economic downturn have been laying off workers by the tens of thousands. It didn’t help that the government was seen as mismanaging the national pension and health care programs, which are running out of money.
Grass-roots consumer groups had pressed the government for years to do something about what they saw as a widening gap between rich and poor–or kakusa shakai, in Japanese. But bureaucrats and politicians had the final say about the national agenda. They rarely made ordinary Japanese part of the policy debate. Hatoyama’s administration has been moving quickly to change that.
http://www.businessweek.com/globalbiz/blog/eyeonasia/archives/2009/10/japan_govts_pov.html
One in six Japanese living in poverty: survey
Nearly one in every six Japanese lives in poverty, one of the highest rates among developed countries, according to the latest survey by Japan’s welfare ministry.
In Japan’s first official calculation of its relative poverty rate, the ministry said 15.7 percent of Japanese people lived on less than half the median disposable income in 2006.
The figure, based on national statistics of income in 2006, was up from a figure of 14.6 percent for 1997 according to the newly released ministry data.
Japan is confirmed to be “among the worst” of the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development’s (OECD) member countries, Health, Labour and Welfare Minister Akira Nagatsuma said Tuesday.
“I want to implement policies to improve the figure, with child-raising allowances and other measures,” Nagatsuma said.
The ratio could be worse by now as Japanese workers’ salaries have fallen amid the economic slump following the 2008 global financial crisis.
The centre-left government, which ousted conservatives in August elections, has promised family-friendly policies, including a monthly allowance to households with young children.
An OECD report showed that Japan had the fourth-highest relative poverty rate among 30 member countries in the mid-2000s.
Japan’s rate came to 14.9 percent in 2004, behind worst-ranked Mexico with 18.4 percent, Turkey with 17.5 percent and the United States with 17.1 percent.
The OECD report also showed the poverty rate for working single-parent households was very high in Japan, reaching 58 percent, far above second-worst Luxembourg with 38 percent.
The Japanese ministry has not calculated a poverty rate for single-parent households.
Nagatsuma has said he plans to reinstate an extra allowance to financially strapped single-parent households, possibly in December.
The allowance was gradually reduced from 2005 and completely scrapped earlier this year under the previous governments’ policy of putting more emphasis on job training to help single parents earn money by themselves.
http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5hT_bXvi0R7kJPuft8LSyfjcqt-aQ
English instructors hired illegally: union
A labor union of foreign workers requested Monday that the Aichi prefectural board of education address the concerns of English-language instructors at public schools who they say are working under illegal contracts.
The [NUGW Tokyo Nambu sister union] General Union, based in the city of Osaka, said an investigation it conducted last month and communications with municipal boards of education show that foreign teaching assistants in 16 school districts in the prefecture are contracted by private language schools or other agents rather than the school boards themselves.
The union charges that by going through agencies, the school boards are “avoiding the obligation of hiring them directly that comes after a certain period of (temporary) employment has elapsed.”
“It is lowering the quality of education as the situation generates anxiety (among instructors) about their employment and does not guarantee continuity in classroom teaching,” the union said.
The union alleges the instructors’ employment terms are in violation of the Worker Dispatch Law.
The Tokai municipal board of education is “especially malicious in that (it) has refused a demand for collective bargaining,” the union said. It filed an appeal with the Aichi labor bureau to address the situation with the Tokai board.
In 2007, English-language instructors in 23 school districts in Osaka Prefecture faced a similar employment issue. After the revelation of their situation, the local labor bureau issued instructions and the municipal boards of education switched to direct hiring or legal labor contracting.
‘Pension falsification rampant’ in Ibaraki Pref.
Some social insurance offices in Ibaraki Prefecture falsified company managers’ average monthly earnings that will be used as the basis for calculating their pensions, and deleted 10 percent of companies’ delinquent accounts from official records, according to sources close to the office.
The sources said some of the offices falsified data to make their pension premium collection rates appear higher than they really were. The sources also said there was a so-called Ibaraki rule, which stated that only monthly salaries of management-level employees would be lowered and the offices had been provided with software that had been programmed to automatically calculate the delinquent accounts to be deleted.
According to pension insurance premium collection records for fiscal 2005, which The Yomiuri Shimbun acquired, of the 1.4 billion yen in past delinquent accounts, 145.02 million yen was erased at the Tsuchiura Social Insurance Office. At the Mito Minami Social Insurance Office, 84.08 million yen, or about 4 percent of its 2 billion yen worth of delinquent accounts, was deleted.
The two offices’ deleted amounts far outstripped the 150,000 yen to 6 million yen deleted at the other three offices in the prefecture the same fiscal year.
According to the sources, the office summoned managers of companies that had failed to pay premiums and first unsettled them by seizing their companies’ deposits and savings before asking them to sign an agreement to “pay the arrears,” which actually amounted to an agreement to take part in the delinquent account deletion scheme.
The sources said pension office staff persuaded many of the managers to lower the salaries listed in the pension records. For example, an official would ask a manager, “Your executive salary is registered as 500,000 yen here but it’s actually 200,000 yen, isn’t it?” adding, “If you agree to correct the salary, your company’s delinquent account total will be reduced by 10 million yen.”
The Ibaraki rule restricted the targets of this “persuasion” to corporate managers and their families, as it was seen as unfair for regular employees to have their future pension payouts reduced.
The software used to calculate which delinquent accounts should be deleted was distributed to pension officials responsible for collecting the premiums via USB memory sticks in fiscal 2002.
Ibaraki Prefecture’s collection rate for employee pension insurance premiums was ranked 46th among the nation’s 47 prefectures from fiscal 2001 to fiscal 2003. But it shot up to the 37th in fiscal 2004 and 24th in fiscal 2005.
Schools for foreigners, technical colleges included in DPJ’s free high school lesson plan
Technical colleges and schools attended by foreigners will be included in the Democratic Party of Japan’s pledge to make high school lessons free of charge, it has emerged.
The Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology has decided to make high school courses at technical colleges and vocational schools subject to the move, together with various schools for foreigners. It plans to include the necessary expenses in next fiscal year’s budget allocation request.
“We want to support learning chances for as many people as possible,” Deputy Education Minister Kan Suzuki said when questioned by the Mainichi.
Various schools operating under the School Education Law will be included in the measure, even if their students are of foreign nationality, meaning the DPJ’s move will apply to schools for Korean students and to international schools. However, Suzuki indicated that schools operating without approval — commonly seen among schools such as those for Brazilian children — would not be included.
“It is desirable that support is provided within the framework of the system,” he said, adding, “There is a need for revisions such as lowering the bar for approval.”
http://mdn.mainichi.jp/mdnnews/news/20091014p2a00m0na012000c.html
Haraguchi positive on foreigner voting rights
Internal Affairs and Communications Minister Kazuhiro Haraguchi responded positively Thursday to the proposed granting of voting rights to foreign nationals with permanent residency in gubernatorial, mayoral and local assembly elections.
“Some conclusion should be reached on the matter, and I want to seek a realistic response,” he said in an interview with news organizations.
A number of DPJ lawmakers are hesitant about granting local voting rights to foreigners. Opponents also include financial services minister Shizuka Kamei, head of Kokumin Shinto (People’s New Party), one of the DPJ’s coalition partners.
Liberal Democratic Party President Sadakazu Tanigaki is also cool on the idea.
In a 1995 decision, the Supreme Court ruled that the Constitution does not forbid a law being passed to guarantee local voting rights to foreign residents.
The DPJ, New Komeito and the Japanese Communist Party have submitted such bills to the Diet a total of 12 times since 1998. However, the bills were scrapped due to opposition mainly from the long-ruling LDP, which was recently ousted from power.
Kamei blames Keidanren for rise in suicides
The Japan Business Federation (Nippon Keidanren) is responsible for the recent increase in the number of family murder-suicides, according to financial and postal affairs minister Shizuka Kamei, an outspoken politician who has stirred controversy since his appointment last month.
Firms have stopped treating people as humans and this has led to an increase in families taking their lives, Kamei said in a speech Monday. He said that when he met with Fujio Mitarai, chairman of the business lobby, in May, “I told him Nippon Keidanren should feel responsible for this.”
2 gangsters held over holding of ex-Nova boss
Two members of the Yamaguchi-gumi crime syndicate were arrested on the spot Monday on suspicion of confining the former president of the failed language school chain Nova Corp. inside a Tokyo hotel, police said.
According to senior police officials, the two men confined Nozomu Sahashi, 58, who has been sentenced to 3-1/2 years’ imprisonment for professional embezzlement, inside a room of a hotel in Chuo Ward, Tokyo, from about 11:30 a.m. to 3 p.m. Monday.
On the same day at about 3 p.m., investigators rescued Sahashi and arrested the two men. Sahashi, who is currently appealing the ruling, did not suffer any injury.
Brace for a possible spring shock
When spring approaches next year, many foreigners in Japan could be in for a rude awakening: From April 1, all those who apply to extend their visa in Japan will be asked to show proof of enrollment in one or other of Japan’s main national health systems, the shakai hoken (social health insurance and pension) or kokumin kenko hoken (national health insurance).
When that time comes, it won’t help to present details of your own private health plan, or to argue about the inefficiencies of the system for foreigners. Japan has had a mandatory universal health care system in place since 1961, meaning that any resident over 20 must be enrolled, whether employed or unemployed, Japanese or non-Japanese.
If you are working for a company in Japan, chances are that you are (or need to be) enrolled in shakai hoken, in which you pay half of your health insurance premiums and your company pays the rest. There isn’t much ambiguity about shakai hoken: If a company employs more than five people, and an employee is working more than 30 hours a week for a period longer than 2 months, the company is obligated to submit paperwork for an employee’s health insurance and pension to the Social Insurance Agency within five days of hiring. With shakai hoken comes the kosei nenkin, or pension plan; the two are a set, and enrollment is mandatory whether you plan to retire in Japan or not.
Meanwhile, people who are unemployed, self-employed, employed by a small firm or retired should be enrolled in kokumin kenko hoken (national health insurance). People paying into this system have to sign up on their own for kokumin nenkin (the national pension) at their city ward office.
On the positive side, the new guidelines will at least force the issue into the open so that there are fewer people … blindsided by back payments, says Yujiro Hiraga, president of [Zenkoku Ippan Tokyo General Union’s predecessor] the National Union of General Workers, Tokyo Nambu. “I think it will be a good source of pressure for employers to enroll their staff.” But, he adds, “The negative effect is that it might encourage more secrecy among people and companies without it.”
He notes that the number of employers who enroll their staff in insurance is shrinking with the economic downturn, and that things could get worse: A labor ministry survey last year found that over 100,000 companies had not enrolled their staff in shakai hoken as of March 2008.