Japanese government considering reforms to temporary employment laws

July 9, 2008
By Ken Worsley

The Japanese government is currently discussing a bill that would prohibit temporary staff companies from dispatching day laborers, as well as require firms to tell workers about the commissions that are deducted from their wages. Of course, a cap on those commissions is not being considered (and I agree with this), but given what we saw happening at temp firms such as Goodwill, it’s obvious that more transparency is needed in this realm.

The Asahi has done a writeup on this proposed law in English at their website. However, what originally caught my eye was a post entitled simply “Temp workers” by Roy Berman over at the Mutantfrog Travelogue. Roy’s post gives a clear insight to the plight of Japan’s temporary, part-time and contract workers.

Since 1986, the trend has clearly been to relax labor laws in order to allow firms to hire more and more of their workforce as non-salaried workers. In 2004, the trend seemed to have peaked as the government allowed even positions in the manufacturing industry to be filled with temporary workers on contracts up to three years. Reversing this trend will not be easy, but trying to do so might gain some populist support for certain politicians in an forthcoming election cycle that promises to bring social issues to the forefront.

Filed Under Blogosphere, Business, Labor and Wages