Reconciling work and family commitments is a challenge in every country, but particularly for Japanese men and women. Much more so than in most other OECD countries, men and women have to choose between babies and bosses: men choose bosses, women less so, but on the whole there are very few babies and there is too little female employment. These shortcomings are increasingly coming to the fore and will have to be addressed.
Japan is ageing and its working-age population is declining. In fact, the Japanese labour force will decline by about 10 million people to around 50 million workers in 2030 (Chart), and the ratio of working-age people to the elderly will fall from 2.8 nowadays to 1.3 in 2050. Japan needs to make more efficient use of everyone’s skills to address the looming labour shortages: greater gender equality is key to sustaining economic growth. To illustrate the potential gains: if female labour force participation rates of some 63% today were to catch up with male employment rates of 84% over the next 20 years, then the fall in labour supply would be limited. Not only that, the economy would expand by almost 20% over two decades.
See full Article: http://www.oecdobserver.org/news/fullstory.php/aid/4336/Closing_the_gender_gap_can_boost_the_economy.html
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