JAPAN / Society

A woman's job in Japan: watch kids, care for parents, work late

Hiromi Nakasaki, a software industry consultant who uprooted her life to look after her ailing mother, walks along a street in Tokyo last month. While Prime Minister Shinzo Abe promotes the idea that the workforce needs more women, the government has done little to lift the burden of their traditional obligation to care for the elderly. | BLOOMBERG

By Yoshiaki Nohara
Bloomberg

May 11, 2015

Hiromi Nakasaki remembers working past midnight on New Year's Eve and during holidays as a business systems consultant in Japan's notoriously harsh work environment. Last summer, at the height of her career, she quit.

A consultant in the software industry in Tokyo, Nakasaki uprooted her life to look after her ailing mother, roughly 670 km away in Matsuyama, Ehime Prefecture.

"I didn't want to wait until something happened to her," said Nakasaki, 55. "I wanted to stay with my mother and help her live as long as she could."

A woman's job in Japan: watch kids, care for parents, work late

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