The labour market recovery from the COVID‑19 recession has been strong, but lost momentum in 2022 and early 2023 in the context of the economic slowdown. However, employment and unemployment have held their ground, and job vacancy rates remain high in most countries, despite some signs of easing. By May 2023, the OECD unemployment rate had fallen to 4.8%, a level not seen in decades.
In Japan, both employment and unemployment have been broadly stable in the past year. In May 2023, the number of employed fell to 67.4 million compared with December 2019 (‑0.7%) due to population ageing and decline, while the unemployment rate eased back to 2.6%, still above pre‑crisis levels.
The OECD Economic Outlook 2023 projects that Japan’s unemployment rate will remain stable, at 2.5% in Q4 2023 and at 2.4% in Q4 2024, and that its total employment is to stabilise around 1.0% below the Q4 2019 level over the course of 2023‑24.
Gender-based disparities in labour markets remain large in Japan. For instance, its gender pay gap was 22% in 2021, in contrast to an OECD average of 12%. Recently, however, a series of reforms have been taken to tackle gender issues. From July 2022, the Act on Promotion of Women’s Participation and Advancement in the Workplace obliges large firms to disclose the gender pay gap. In April 2023, the Children and Families Agency was established to centralise childcare and parenting support policy and its budget is to double by the early 2030s. In June 2023, the government announced the initiative to encourage firms listed in the Tokyo Stock Exchange Prime Market to: i) select at least one female board member by 2025; and ii) ensure that female representation in the boardroom be at least 30%.