Japan encourages men to take parental leave

T. TRUC (According to Japan Times, Kyodo News)

The Japanese government has just announced a plan to encourage more men to take parental leave, considering it one of the priority policies in the next three years to address the low birth rate.

A father carries his child to the park during a paternity leave. Photo: Kyodo

Masanobu Ogura, the minister in charge of childcare, has expressed his determination to address the inequality in childcare duties, which are largely borne by women. “We aim to shift from supporting the balance between work and childcare to promoting double income and joint childcare, in order to eliminate gender bias in all roles,” Ogura said.

According to government data, Japanese husbands spend only about two hours a day on housework and child-rearing, compared with three hours or more in Sweden, Norway and the United States. The number of children is expected to increase if husbands spend more time on housework and childcare. In fiscal 2021, only 13.97% of men took parental leave. The government has raised its target to boost the rate from 30% to 50% by 2025 and aims to increase it to 85% by 2030. “The public and private sectors will work together to create a society where parental leave is the norm,” the government report said.

To achieve the goals, the government will lower the standards for men to take parental leave. First, it will increase benefits to ease the fear of losing income during maternity leave. Specifically, subsidies will increase from the current 80% to 100% of income for couples who take parental leave, including postnatal leave, from the current 80%. The government will also compensate for the loss of income for those who work fewer hours until their children turn 2. “Ensuring that young people’s incomes increase is a prerequisite for measures to combat the low birth rate,” Ogura added.

But concerns about a loss of income are not the only factor keeping men from taking parental leave. A government survey found that the current work environment is not friendly to men using or planning to use paternity leave. Specifically, 41.4% of men said they did not take leave because they did not want to lose income, 27.3% said the office atmosphere made it difficult for them to take parental leave or that their workplace did not value it, while 21.7% said they had tasks that only they could handle.

To help tackle the problem, the government plans to increase subsidies to small and medium-sized companies so they can pay “subsidies” to colleagues to take over work for those on parental leave.

Mitsui Sumitomo Insurance was a pioneer in this policy, launching a program to provide up to 100,000 yen to colleagues of employees who take childcare leave from April. The company initially planned to subsidize benefits for employees taking childcare leave, but after listening to employees, it was found that taking leave would be easier if colleagues around them received benefits.

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