40 Hours of Overtime per Week

YOU CAN WORK YOURSELF TO DEATH, BUT YOU ARE MORE LIKELY TO DIE FROM THE SHAME OF DISAPPOINTING THE EXPECTATIONS OF YOUR BOSS. THROUGH REGULATORY ACTIONS AND PUBLIC LISTS OF OFFENDING COMPANIES, THE JAPANESE GOVERNMENT IS TRYING TO STEM THE DUAL PLAGUES OF KAROSHI AND KAROJISATSU. BUT SOCIETY DOES NOT SEEM TO BE READY YET

by Elisa Bertolini, Dept. of Legal Studies, Bocconi
Translated by Alex Foti

 
Karōshi (過労死), i.e. death (死, shi) caused by too much (過, ka) work (労, rō), and its variant karōjisatsu (過労自殺), suicide induced by too much work, are the two stigma that afflict the world of Japanese employment.
 
According to a 2015 government survey, a quarter of Japanese companies require their employees put in 80 hours of overtime work per month, which usually goes unpaid. In addition, about 12% of employees work as much as 100 hours monthly in excess of their standard worktime, while we know that beyond the 80-hour overtime threshold, death by karōshi becomes an actual possibility. In 2015, 2,159 suicides were recorded in Japan, of which 93 were attributable to karōshi, and 96 deaths due to heart attacks were likely to have been caused by karōshi.
 
The phenomenon is peculiar to Japanese society, and the measures taken by the government to counteract it have so far been ineffective, due to labor laws lacking teeth in terms of enforcement. These should be radically changed, in particular the Labor Standard Law (労働基準法, rōdōkijunhō), which hasn't been reformed since 1947. Japan's society is heavily hierarchical and characterized by the pursuit of career success. Moreover, since it is a culture where shame weighs heavily, the fear of falling short of the expectations of superiors causes employees to overstretch beyond their limits.
 
A major rethinking of the role of the employee and his/her rights in the social and business environment is indispensable for any campaign against karōshi to succeed. An alternative solution focuses on government intervention in two directions: putting pressure on large corporations, and comprehensive labor law reform. For the time being, the choice has fallen on the first solution: for a shame-based society, the practice of shaming so-called black companies (ブラック企業, burakku kigyō) through a list published on the website of the Ministry of Health, Labor and Social Affairs has been considered the most appropriate measure.
 
The list, for the period going from 1 October 2010 to 30 June 2017, contains the names of 334 companies under judicial investigation for labor violations, including karōshi. It is divided into six columns: the name of the company guilty of workers' rights violations; seat of the same; the date on which the government authorities delivered documentation to the judiciary; legislative provisions being violated; summary of charges, and number of executives reported to justice. Mention in the black list, updated monthly, lasts at least one year, save for adoption of remedial and corrective measures by the company entailing deletion from it.
 
Another government initiative is Premium Friday: employees are asked to clock out of the office at 3:00 pm every last Friday of the month, to spend time with their families. Similarly, coming under government pressure, several companies have implemented shutdown of lights in their offices between 10pm and 5am to discourage excessive overwork. However, the voluntary nature of such measures undermines their effectiveness.
 
The government is also addressing labor law reform and, with the agreement of labor unions, is proposing a maximum ceiling of 45 hours of overtime work monthly and 360 hours annually, with an absolute maximum of 100 overtime hours in a single month, or an average of 80 hours a month over a period of two to six months. Unchanged remains Article 41 of the Labor Standard Law, which provides that those who fill managerial roles are excluded from any restrictions on overtime as well as its payment. There is also no proposal to change Article 36, which enables a company and its employees, after signing a management agreement, to register with the Labor Standard Inspection Office to exceed the 40-hour weekly limit on overtime set by Article 32 (a maximum of 8 hours per day, which can be derogated only in case of special need, as per Art. 32-2/32-5). It should be clear that if the Japanese government is serious about combating karōshi, oy should first of all change Article 36, but Japanese society doesn't seem yet ready to start unwinding and work less.