A Japanese government project team on June 5 approved an interim report encouraging five industries with significant gender wage gaps to develop action plans for closing the disparity.
The five industries — finance and insurance, food manufacturing, retail, electronics and precision equipment, and air transport — are expected to start drawing up these plans within this year.
The project team is urging them to quickly publish the plans and consider setting goals related to the proportion of female hires and other measures for promoting women’s roles in the workforce and economy.
The government considers eliminating gender pay disparity essential for achieving sustainable wage increases that exceed inflation.
This will also be positioned as a key pillar in the Basic Policies for Economic and Fiscal Management and Structural Reform, a guideline for economic and fiscal management to be compiled in late June.
Prime Minister Fumio Kishida stated at the team meeting, “The interim report is just a milestone. We will proceed with transforming workplace environments to eliminate the gap, and strongly promote necessary policies to achieve structural wage increases and further advance women’s participation.”
The pay disparity is attributed to factors including the ratio of men to women in managerial positions and differences in years of service, as well as “entrenching gender roles” through career track divisions, such as general versus specialised jobs.
The recommendations also pointed out deep-rooted unconscious bias hindering women’s advancement.
In connection with the interim recommendations, on June 5 the Cabinet Office published an estimate that a household’s lifetime disposable income would increase by some 170 million yen (about $1.24 million) if women continued to work full-time after childbirth compared to leaving the workforce for good.
The team, chaired by Kishida’s wages and employment adviser Wakako Yata, was launched in April.
Following the revision of an ordinance under the Act on the Promotion of Women’s Active Engagement in Professional Life in July 2022, companies with more than 300 employees are required to disclose gender pay disparity data.
The government project team has been analyzing issues in the five industries based on this wage disparity data. – Mainichi Japan
