Career Woman - Recent Times

Recent Times

By the year 2000, 40.7% of the total Japanese work force were female workers, with 56.9% of those women being married, indicating the path of career woman was not just open to the single women of Japan. by the end of the 1990s, women were concentrated in light manufacturing work, such as food production, as well as tertiary industries, like retail business, restaurants, and financing companies. In Japan, the idea of a part-time worker is someone who works for a set period, with no bonuses or fringe benefits. Many employers used part-time women workers as supplementary labor with no chance of advancement and unstable job security.

Despite some legislation passed in 1985 to ensure equality, both the Equal Opportunity Law, which prohibits discrimination, and the Child-Care Leave Law, which gives parents unpaid leave to tend to children, then return to their old position or a similar one, lacked any real power to drive change. No penalties were issued for companies who ignored this, meaning, only women who take on the same burden as male employees, of working full-time, with no breaks for pregnancy or child rearing, are able to have any hope of advancement. Boards of directors, public servants, and judiciary branches of work are typically closed to any career woman not willing to work full-time and overtime regularly. The largest part of the labor force are not the full-time career women, but housewives who work part-time, supplementing the household budget. In fact, the government discourages housewives from making too much money, because if housewives make a certain amount, they lose their husband's dependent allowance. This limits the jobs women can do while married. In many instances of the Japanese work force, women who wish to receive equal pay and chances at promotion are expected to act like their salaryman counterparts. This is indicative of one of the problems women face when seeking employment in Japan. While equal in part, they still face discrimination. Many businesses lack the flexibility to offer work which fits the irregular schedules of housewives. There have been some strides forward however. The equal employment legislation of the 1980s did prohibit discrimination in the training, benefits, retirement, and dismissal, however, not in recruitment, hiring, or promotion.