Japan yesterday said it would have to amend its upcoming budget to fund compensation for people whose benefits were underpaid for years because of a scandal involving erroneous labor data.
The Japanese Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare this week said that it has for years failed to collect complete data for its monthly employment report, which is closely watched as an indicator of wages and work hours.
The data help determine various government benefits, including employment insurance.
Officials are supposed to gather data from all firms with 500 or more employees, but in Tokyo only about one-third of 1,400 such firms were surveyed.
The scandal dates back to 2004 and a total of ￥53 billion (US$489.4 million) is to be repaid to 20 million workers, the ministry said.
“I have received a report from the labor and welfare ministry that they need to provide employment insurance and other payments retroactively,” government spokesman Yoshihide Suga told reporters. “We will make adjustments to make a necessary budget allocation in the fiscal 2019 budget” for the year starting in April.
The government is probing dozens of other major data sets, he added.
Japanese Minister of Health, Labour and Welfare Takumi Nemoto admitted he received a report about the problem as early as Dec. 20.
The ministry nevertheless went ahead and published data on Dec. 21 and Wednesday that it knew had sampling problems, raising questions about the reliability of official statistics in Japan.
The monthly labor survey has been watched by the government and the Bank of Japan as a clue for their economic policy decisions.
It is “extremely regrettable” that confidence in the survey was shaken, Suga said, while Nemoto voiced “sincere apologies for causing trouble to the people.”
The pledge by Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi to “work, work, work, work and work” for her country has been named the catchphrase of the year, recognizing the effort Japan’s first female leader had to make to reach the top. Takaichi uttered the phrase in October when she was elected as head of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP). Many were initially as worried about her work ethic as supportive of her enthusiasm. In a country notorious for long working hours, especially for working women who are also burdened with homemaking and caregiving, overwork is a sensitive topic. The recognition triggered a
Tropical Storm Koto killed three people and left another missing as it approached Vietnam, authorities said yesterday, as strong winds and high seas buffeted vessels off the country’s flood-hit central coast. Heavy rains have lashed Vietnam’s middle belt in recent weeks, flooding historic sites and popular holiday destinations, and causing hundreds of millions of dollars in damage. Authorities ordered boats to shore and diverted dozens of flights as Koto whipped up huge waves and dangerous winds, state media reported. Two vessels sank in the rough seas, a fishing boat in Khanh Hoa province and a smaller raft in Lam Dong, according to the
‘HEART IS ACHING’: Lee appeared to baffle many when he said he had never heard of six South Koreans being held in North Korea, drawing criticism from the families South Korean President Lee Jae-myung yesterday said he was weighing a possible apology to North Korea over suspicions that his ousted conservative predecessor intentionally sought to raise military tensions between the war-divided rivals in the buildup to his brief martial law declaration in December last year. Speaking to reporters on the first anniversary of imprisoned former South Korean president Yoon Suk-yeol’s ill-fated power grab, Lee — a liberal who won a snap presidential election following Yoon’s removal from office in April — stressed his desire to repair ties with Pyongyang. A special prosecutor last month indicted Yoon and two of his top
The Philippines deferred the awarding of a project that is part of a plan to build one of the world’s longest marine bridges after local opposition over the potential involvement of a Chinese company due to national security fears. The proposals are “undergoing thorough review” by the Asian Development Bank (ADB), which acts as a lender and an overseer of the project to ensure it meets international environmental and governance standards, the Philippine Department of Public Works and Highways said in a statement on Monday in response to queries from Bloomberg. The agency said it would announce the winning bidder once ADB
RSS