In a nod to Japan’s gradual efforts to level the playing field for women, the ratio of working mothers rose to a record last year, but the details reflect a still severe gender gap in the country.
Some 76% of mothers with children under the age of 18 were in the workforce in 2021, the health ministry said in a report Friday. That was nearly 20 percentage points higher than in 2004.
The data however also indicated many of those jobs were in relatively unstable positions. Last year 37% of mothers were in nonpermanent jobs that are often part time and lack benefits, while only 30% had permanent roles.
The government has shortened waitlists at day care and bolstered its parental leave policies. But a strident working environment that places emphasis on long working hours means many mothers — also saddled with higher child care burdens than in other advanced economies — can only get jobs that lack financial stability.
Prime Minister Fumio Kishida said he will seek to close the Group of Seven’s highest gender pay gap as part of his efforts to raise wages overall, but the data suggests there’s still some distance to go.
Women in Japan earn just 77.5% of what men do, a gap Kishida is looking to curb by requiring companies to disclose the wage gap between male and female workers as part of his cornerstone "new capitalism” platform.
Without closing the pay gap, Kishida’s goal of getting wages to rise to a level where it’s part of a positive cycle of economic growth may become even harder.