WUNRN
JAPAN - WORKING WOMEN - NEW
OPPORTUNITIES - STILL INEQUALITIES
September 12, 2010
Married or single? Working full-time or part-time?
Earning high or low? A few decades ago, Japanese women rarely attended
university. But more choices and economic pressure have brought new polarities
to their expectations.
If they graduated, they became teachers or telephone
operators. Single women in their 30s were called "loser dogs."
"I was one of the few special women who went on to
university," Nakayama said. "After I graduated, I worked as a teacher
in a private school owned by a big company. There was a lot of discrimination
between men and women. Women could never become managers or section
chiefs."
In the 1980s women still mainly studied how to be a good
wives, she said. They learned cooking, tea ceremony and flower arrangement.
"Nowadays it's a lot better: Instead of just learning to be good wives,
young women go to sports clubs."
These choices, however, aren't
evenly distributed or enjoyed, argues Toshiaki Tachibanaki, an economist and
author of the attention-getting book here, "The New Paradox for Japanese
Women: Greater Choice, Greater Inequalities." The book was published in
English by International House of Japan in 2010, after a Japanese-language release
in 2008 by the publisher Tokyo Keizai.
In his book, Tachibanaki asserts women now have more
choices in their careers--they can work full-time, part-time or at home. But
Daughters' Education Sacrificed
"Before
But as this changed, and as girls moved into universities
and the work force, numerous new gaps formed among them.
Chizuko Ueno, a professor of sociology at the
Women working for pay don't necessarily do it by choice,
added Ueno, who sees the gap between full-time homemakers and working women
often explained by their husbands' incomes.
"Many housewives don't work because they don't need
to, but the latter work because they need a supplementary income," she
said.
Another big gap that separates Japanese women is working
part time or full time.
Part-time workers are
normally employed for six months or a year. They are paid on an hourly basis
and are sometimes paid less than their male counterparts. They do not have paid
vacation or allowances to support pensions.
Women made up about 89 percent of
The peak of unemployment in
Still Making Coffee
Mikiko Kamura, 33, quit a job in the personnel department
of an electric appliance company after three years, citing a burdensome work
culture for women.
"At the office, in addition to a lot of paper work,
usually women had to support men by making coffee, arranging tickets for
business trips, answering phone calls, making photocopies, etc," she said.
It was standard practice at the company for female
employees to quit if they got married or had children. Kamura recently got
married and is thinking about her future. If she gets pregnant she would like
to take maternity leave and return to her current job as an event planner. But
in
"In
"The leading Democratic Party in
Setting up good facilities with reliable day care systems
and staff for children is what young parents really need, she added.
Twenty-eight-year-old Taisuke Yamamura, a fitness
trainer, says when he gets married he would like his wife to stay at home and
take care of the household. But it will depend if he makes enough money to
support a family.
"If my wife wanted to work, I would respect what she
thinks," he said. "I can't force her to stay at home."