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ANA caricature speaks volumes about Japan’s outdated mind-set
By Hifumi Okunuki Last month, a new ANA commercial hit the airwaves — and quickly ran into some serious turbulence. The scene is Haneda Airport. Two Japanese men dressed as pilots stand with their backs to the camera. “Haneda has more international flights nowadays,” says one. “Finally,” replies the other. “Next stop, Vancouver,” the first man says.…
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Restore the shuttered-up New Year’s of yore
BY HIFUMI OKUNUKI First of all, I would like to wish a happy new year to all the readers of Labor Pains. While labor news has generally been a gloomy topic of late, it is my hope that this year will bring brighter things for me to write about. As I draft this first column…
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The year in labor: the Top 5 pains of 2013
By Hifumi Okunuki Illustrations by Time O’Bree Japan’s old calendar called December shiwasu (師走). These two kanji mean “teacher” and “run.” The idea was that the last month of the year is so busy that even a staid, starch-shirted professor finds him or herself scurrying around like a rabbit, trying to get everything done on time. As…
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Real ‘labor cops’ also deserve to get the star treatment
By Hifumi Okunuki Television meant little to me until this autumn. Now, every Wednesday at 10 p.m., I sit squarely in front of the tube, glued to the set for the next hour of the new comedy “Dandarin.” In the show, Yuko Takeuchi plays a stubborn, by-the-book labor standards inspector named Rin Danda who loathes…
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Is Sulejman Brkic no longer a member of the ICC Family?
Tozen member Sulejman Brkic was bloody illegally fired. ICC Language Schools is a language school that has six branches in the Kanto area, with its headquarters in Yokohama. Sulejman Brkic has been teaching English and French courses at this school for twenty years. He has always been very popular among his students, not only because…
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スレイマン・ブルキッチ組合員は、もう「ICC Family」じゃないの？！
株式会社ICC（本社：横浜市）は、関東地域に６つのスクールをもつ語学学校です。スレイマン・ブルキッチ組合員は、20年間にわたり、ICCで英語とフランス語の講師として仕事をしてきました。ちょっぴり皮肉やさんながらとてもチャーミングな彼は、教え方にとても定評があり、生徒たちからの人気も抜群でした。彼はやりがいと情熱をもって20年間働いてきました。
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The Special Dismissal Zone: where legal protections no longer apply
I couldn’t believe my ears when I heard about the government’s recent proposal to set up a Special Dismissal Zone on Japanese territory. “A what?” I hear you cry. The Shinzo Abe government wants to make Japan “the most business-friendly climate in the world.” In May, he set up a National Strategy Special Zone Working Group,…
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Union, business concerns put limits on freedom of speech by Hifumi Okunuki
Hot on the heels of their romp to victory in the race for control of the House of Councilors, the Liberal Democratic Party is chomping at the bit to overhaul the Constitution, which has not been amended since it was signed into law in 1946. The ruling party proposes gutting Article 9, which forever bans…
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Changes to Japan’s employment law effective from 1 April 2013
Changes to Japan’s employment law effective from 1 April 2013 As of 1 April 2013, Japan’s minimum retirement age will increase to 65 years, with further restriction on scope to refuse re-employment after an earlier company retirement age. New amendments to Japan’s Labour Contracts Act (“LCA”) will also come into effect, concerning fixed term employees…
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Employers’ ‘box them in, drive them out’ tactics fail legal test
Surely few employees would jump out of bed every morning, itching to start work at the “Department for Driving Them Out”? But what is an oidashi-beya? And what scary entities are to be driven out? The answer is neither ghosts nor zombies. It is you. Some companies have been known to set up departments dubbed by…