More than 890,000 new graduates started work across Japan on Wednesday, the first day of the new fiscal year. Thousands of young people dressed in dark suits could be seen in big cities heading to orientation ceremonies.
Many companies increased the number of hires this year for the first time in at least three years. Among them were Sumitomo Mitsui Bank (1,813 new graduates), Toyota (1,504) and Panasonic (600).
At some welcome ceremonies, employees wrote their aspirations on paper planes and threw them into the air, Sankei Shimbun reported.
All Nippon Airways hired 1,187 employees, while Skymark Airlines, which filed for bankruptcy in January, took on 11 graduates.
Tokyo Electric Power Co (TEPCO), which is struggling to deal with the stricken Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, hired 700 new graduates this year.
© Japan Today
30 Comments
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Wc626
Welcome to the Rat Race folks-
umbrella
You too have won the right to be worked to death by corporate japan. Congratulations not!
Schopenhauer
I am a Japanese but I don't like Japanese scenes like this and many others including Koshien high school baseballs. They are regimental. That was one of the reasons I did not join a Japanese company after graduation.
M3M3M3
I'm sure the only aspiration of the new Skymark recruits is to have a job this time next year. Can't imagine what it feels like to be hired by the administrators of a bankrupt company. I feel really sorry for them!
Disillusioned
Is it induction or seduction?
Sensato
Japan actually has a shortage of labor now, after two decades where fresh graduates struggled to find jobs, with many ending up woefully underemployed — the lost generation.
The last time the nation faced this dilemma was the late 1980s before the stock market bubble burst. In those days, Japanese companies were frantically competing for new graduates, and went to great (and absurd) lengths to recruit them.
Behind this new graduate shortage, around 3 million people per year were born in Japan in the years immediately following the war. Those people are now hitting the 65 mark and leaving the workforce in droves. The newly retired are being replaced by this crop of graduates who were born in a year of fewer more than 1 million births. The math is working in their favor when it comes to availability of job opportunities.
GW
Good luck, they are going to need it
B.l. Sharma
How many female graduates got employment has not been indicated in this news story . Certain percentage or quota should be fixed the them so as to give adequate representation to women in services.
RedMango
890,000 new graduates I hope they make it It's not an easy journey http://a-week-in-the-life-of-a-tokyo-salary-man.webeden.co.uk/
Wakarimasen
Hope i am wrong, but we will see a spate of power harassment and other bullying stories in the press over the coming months.
patty cake champion
Japanese companies have in store for you: long hours (of staying at work), obligatory drinking sessions, and low pay.
Those who managed to enter a foreign company (gaishikei) get the same Japanese experience but actually have to do work with no job security while experiencing a marginally higher take home pay thanks to Japan's ever encouraging tax regime.
Commodore Shmidlap (Retired)
This is what you worked so hard for to pass all those entrance exams. A life of black-suited anonymity and conformity, breaking your back after hours and on weekends for some old guys who inherited the company from some other old guys. Getting shouted at by some middle manager who is getting shouted at by a higher level manager. If you give it your all, you get to retire in your 60s to a family you barely know and have little but contempt for you as you're now a stranger in their midst, a useless mouth to feed instead of a provider. Play pachinko and smoke cigarettes and vote LDP until you die.
Joshua Degreiff
Well I wish the best try to do some stock and forex to survive! Try invest in something have a second income, studying English will help you to be hired outside of Japan. I wish the best people deserves work and be happy!
patty cake champion
Until the early 1990s, this was the life. But with the falling birthrate, the rise of Chinese, and the ascension of developed Western countries to egalitarian knowledge based economies in perspective; young Japanese have to realize that their jobs, Japanese friends, and Japanophile foreign friends will not lead them to new opportunities.
sn00z3
Congratulation new graduates! I'm wondering how much is their starting salary? *wink
Michael Craig
Good for them!
RealityofFake
Is having one time of year to do hiring really the best system?
wanderlust
Next month - gogatsu byou - May sickness - the infamous period when new recruits realise that they have made the wrong choice, and leave the company...
Christopher Glen
Ah, that explains the noisy young men on my train
ownasaur
Aspirations soon to be shut down by unpaid overtime, obligatory nomikais, failnomics arrows, etc.
Stewart Gale
Congratulations. Now, don't even think about going home until at least 9.30pm
nath
This is when they hire new graduates - they do other hires throughout the year for experienced workers.
AyameM
The optimist in me says 'Congrats!' and the realist says 'From here it goes downwards, brace yourselves'. Anyways, good luck.
Novenachama
A heartfelt congratulation on graduating and their new position. We wish all the best as they move forward in their new career.
Serrano
"Sumitomo Mitsui Bank (1,813 new graduates),"
Wow! Sumitomo must be flush with cash! ( compared with Sumo Bank, which went belly-up ) hee hee!
Piotr Kachala
Wonderful! Luck, country!
sangetsu03
Welcome to the machine. We expect you to be at your desk from 8:30, and to stay at your desk until 8:30, oh, and your new company dorm room is 90 minutes away by train. Your salary will be about 15% less than what new grads were paid back in 1984, but you may get a 1% raise next year if inflation increases by at least 3%. Though you are required to be at your desk for 10 hours a day, there is no real requirement that you do any real work. You can work hard if you want to, but you might as well not bother, as it won't get you promoted any faster than if you did no work at all.
On "trainamageddon" day, which was last Monday, the last day of the fiscal year, headcount was reduced at many companies as many workers jumped in front of trains. Make sure you are prepared to get your "densha chien shoumeisho" if your train is delayed on trainamageddon day next year. If you jump in front of the train, of course you are not required to get one.
Ganbatte!
toshiko
Congratullation ! People who never worked for Japan Inc often imagine rat race. But if you have Todai degrees, your position is promised and faster promotion.