Employees in Japan's manufacturing sector worked less overtime in July than a year earlier for the fifth straight month of decline, the labor ministry said Friday.
Average overtime in the sector fell 10.2 percent from a year earlier to 12.3 hours, the Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare ministry said in a report covering businesses with at least five employees.
With nonmanufacturers included, the average overtime fell 5.2 percent to 9.2 hours, also down for the fifth month in a row.
Due to the decline, average overtime pay per worker in all industries dropped 5.7 percent to 17,405 yen in May, the ministry said.
The average basic pay, meanwhile, dropped 0.5 percent to 282,720 yen.
The average overall wage, including summer bonuses and other extra payments, which rose 0.8 percent to 152,178 yen, came to 434,898 yen, unchanged from a year earlier.
The number of employees in all industries in the reporting month fell 0.2 percent to 43.57 million, but of these the number of part-time workers rose 2.6 percent to 9.04 million, showing that employers are increasingly depending on part-timers.