Poverty of single-mother households highlighted

By Keiji Hirano

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Kronos at 10:05 AM JST - 18th March

I believe this is also related with the Japanese culture which generally expects women to become housewives and take care of the children once they get married. Consequently, women forgo any career that they might have at the time and come to depend on their husbands for survival. In case the husband dies, runs away, they get divorced, they are left with the children and no means to support themselves. The article is not clear but I am going to assume majority of the women are like this depending on the sentence on the second paragraph "who receive scholarships from the group after losing their fathers have to forgo higher education due to financial difficulties".

I do not expect to see a quick solution to this problem. Couple of things have to change for this to happen. Japan as a society has to encourage and support women to work and continue with their careers after marriage. There needs to be enough facilities / support centers for working women to take care of their children while working, etc... Government can surely do its part but it will not be enough if other factors stay the same.
ForeignKiri at 11:56 AM JST - 18th March

I am a child of a single family household and have suffered the issues of poverty and so forth so I wouldn't give up hope so easily just because the parent is going through difficulties... many children from my country do what they can to get scholarships, fundraisers , church donations... whatever they can to motivate tehmselves to keep their education in order to support their single parent. And I also agree that a level of counesling should be put in place for both parent and child/children. There are ways to cope and get through these challenges... I honestly feel some Japanese give up too soon.
dennis0bauer at 03:09 PM JST - 18th March

like the government cares, in the recent years have they done anything about the obvious problems, like single mothers, healthcare and so on
European1 at 03:26 PM JST - 18th March

The shift in the government’s support policy for single-mother households, in which the state helps with their self-reliance efforts through vocational training rather than through providing child-care allowance, was called into question at the symposium.

Non existent support in this country. I feel sorry for those mothers who may be single because of death of father, but on the other hand there may be those who divorced and Im not sure but there is no law to punish fathers to pay or they just cut one off and thats it. In my country if you dont pay to your child after divorce you may end up in jail but step is agreement of both sides, next if doesnt work money are taken from fathers salary and passed to mothers bank account. Another punishment is suspension of driver`s license etc.
Kronos at 04:59 PM JST - 18th March

Im not sure but there is no law to punish fathers to pay or they just cut one off and thats it. In my country if you dont pay to your child after divorce you may end up in jail but step is agreement of both sides, next if doesnt work money are taken from fathers salary and passed to mothers bank account. Another punishment is suspension of driver`s license etc.

That is assuming the father is in a position to pay anything. The father might be dead as you said. Even if he is alive he may not be financially strong to cover the child's expense, simply runs away, etc... Then what will happen? This way, one spouse is still dependent on the other for survival.

To the best of their abilities, both parents should have some sort of security to fall back on e.g. their own career, some sort of healthcare program, etc...
Mayuki at 02:55 PM JST - 19th March

‘‘While the government urges single mothers to improve their value as workers, it does not pay much attention to conditions in the labor market.’’

This is the crux of the issue here, I think. Conditions for contract workers are bad, and getting worse.
dieselchic at 07:33 PM JST - 21st March

It's no wonder, how the heck can anyone survive (by themselves) and bring up a child on an average annual income of 2.13 million yen. More and more woman are not wanting to be slaves to the system of cultural discrimination and let the men rule the roost as well as clean and look after them not to mention, not to enjoy any of the "fruits" of marriage life. As Japan is down on the list for romantic interludes compared to other countries.. The government really needs to change the law for single parents and subsidise and give them a proper means of bringing up a child.. Like New Zealand, Australia and many other countries that support single parents... When will Japan get it's act together and modernise itself as the super power that it is....?