Japan’s four-day work week proposal

The Japanese government is planning to initiate a four-day work week in place of the current five-day workweek as part of the annual economy guidelines. The objective here is to ensure work-life balance, so that people can take care of their family or hone their skills required for improving the quality of work.

Given the country is currently facing labour shortage, improving the existing workforce’s productivity is paramount and this plan seeks to do the same. However, many remain unconvinced as to how the improved labour efficiency will compensate for the lost working hours. Also, employees are fearing pay cut because of the loss of workdays.