Japanese university students celebrate their job offers with their new employers.
The Japanese academic year ends in March and new graduates open the door to the next chapter of their lives on April 1. Usually, Japanese university students start looking for a job in autumn (or even summer for internship opportunities) of their 3rd year in university, attend in briefing sessions each company provide in winter then start the actual process such as exams and interviews in spring. This is known as ‘shushoku katsudo’ or ‘simultaneous recruiting of new graduates’.
This year Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare, and Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology announced the job offer rate of new graduates from universities is 81.7%. Doesn’t this seem a bit high? Japanese netizens discuss what this number really means with regards to gender, employment type, employment system, university and so on.
From MSN Sankei:
81.7% of Japanese University Students Have Job Offers Before Graduation; Though Rate Continues to Rise Still At Low Level, According to Survey By Labour and Welfare Ministries
The survey carried out by Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare, and Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology showed on 15th March that the job offer rate of graduating university students this March is 81.7% with the rise of 1.2 points on the same period last year. It’s risen for the second consecutive year yet still nowhere near as high as the late 80% level before the Lehman’s fall in 2008.
According to this survey, 707,000 students (calculated as the number of applicants subtracted by one of potential recruits) still haven’t received job offers yet. On the other hand, 78.8% of female students graduating from two-year colleges have received theirs already, which substantially exceeded the one of last year by 11.9 points. The person in charge for this survey in Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare takes it as given that companies had held recruitment have finally decided to embark on recruitment again.
For male new graduates, this year’s rate is 81.3% with the rise of 0.6 points on the same period last year, for female new graduates, 82.0 with the rise of 1.7 points. For national and public university students, it’s 86.5% with the decrease of 1.1 points and for private university students, it was 80.1% with the rise of 1.9 points.
名刺は切らしておりまして：
This job rate or more adverts for part-time jobs make me feel the economy is as good as the one in the high economic growth era or the bubble period. Well, it includes temporary or contract workers in this increase, and so doesn’t necessarily mean good though.
名刺は切らしておりまして：
Whoa, 80% can get a job. It feels like only 10% can in Tokyo.
名刺は切らしておりまして：
I see the same type of news at this time of every single year. Some of jobs are permanent and some are temporary but overall, the rate
reaches beyond 90% by the end of March anyway.
名刺は切らしておりまして：
Students are being told that it’s risky to have a blank period after graduation and just slip in to sweatshops but leave within a year. This turnover problem has been big too. Well it’s more likely that the escape from a sweatshop only leads us to other sweatshop. We’ll just try and struggle at this current sweatshop as much as possible.
名刺は切らしておりまして：
This rate is only of a few good universities and with contracts and temps included in the number, isn’t it?
名刺は切らしておりまして：
This 80% is a bluff. The rate is actually 60%, including sweatshops and SMEs. It’s based on the number of real geeks that gave a proper report of future employment. The 25% are jobless and 80% of 75% are only permanent employees.
名刺は切らしておりまして：
We should stop the trend that it’s is only to be expected for men to financially support a family. Female management trainees should get married with guys with temp or admin or even without jobs and raise a male child. If a man is in a management position, he’d take all the responsibility of financial support and make kids but if a woman is in the position, she’d want her husband to be in the same position. It only means 1 family created with 2 management positions and losing the opportunities of making 2 families instead (if they were both men, they’d make each family, so there would be 2 families in total). The more women there would be in the management positions, the less men in the positions. In Japan with the men feeding women trend, men would end up not being able to get married. A large majority of incompetent bints would not be able to rely on male income nor get married with them either after all.
名刺は切らしておりまして：
Alright, let’s stop including temps in the rate. They’ll only follow the flow from the working poor to welfare recipients.
名刺は切らしておりまして：
Only less than 50% of graduates with university degrees in their 20s
are permanent employees. The rest is unemployed or temps or just with part-time jobs. These people are mainly with the arts backgrounds. Taking account of it, the majority is with temps. Temps are not something to be ashamed of any more.
名刺は切らしておりまして：
Well, if there’s no recruitment, we shouldn’t make children. The couples making children at the moment really can raise them to get a job?
名刺は切らしておりまして：
80% can get a job! What a great country Japan is!
名刺は切らしておりまして：
Surely it’s high enough.
Comments from Yahoo! Japan:
wolf（val…）さん:
Having a job offer itself is not that important. ‘Don’t wanna be a NEET‘ ‘Don’t wanna be a freeter‘ – then end up in companies with offers that easily? They’re more often than not sweatshops. Leaving there within a short period of time makes it much harder to get a next job. Choosing what company to join should be decided with extra care.
wolf（val…）さん:
This kind of news makes us feel new graduates mean everything in the job hunting. It only upsets students and unfortunately some of them end up in sweatshops. This job hunting structure is a problem.
wolf（val…）さん:
Other surveys such as out of these 81.7%, how many have already left? should be done at this time next year?
GulfSXR（is7…）さん:
Simultaneous recruiting of new graduates should be replaced with some new system – recruiting people at any time of year, whenever new vacancies come up in departments. Fluidity of labour with no distinction of new or formerly graduates should be more considered.
seb*ng*ufre*（seb…）さん:
They’ve worked so hard to get each job offer but it only results in 30% of them leaving their companies within 3 years. How long are we doing this meaningless competition?
keijirou2000（azu…）さん:
Most universities are under the jurisdiction of Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology. They CAN make those universities submit each job rate but they did ask them on the phone instead apparently? What the hell! Suppose they can’t announce all the universities’ rates officially. Rates of a few top ranking universities are being analysed and they find the 80% rate high? Nonsense.
Cream（loc…）さん:
The reality at the universities ranked in F (from A to F based on scores) should be reported properly.
