Crise et suite

Malgre un ton apparemment badin avec lequel je traite du cote du Japon encore epargne par la crise au cours de l'Image du Jour de cette semaine (cliquer ici) la realite de la crise n'est pas a demontrer a l'echelle du "petit peuple" qui commence a en prendre plein les dents, pour parler franchement. Licenciements a tour de bras, en commencant par les moins proteges dont bien sur les etrangers (notamment les ouvriers sud-americains qui se font virer sans menagement les uns apres les autres depuis la fin 2008) et en continuant par la masse des employes non-statutaires qui representent tout de meme pres d'un employe sur trois au Japon. 400.000 nouveaux travailleurs laisses sur le carreau sont "attendus" d'ici a la fin de l'annee fiscale en cours, et tout laisse a penser que l'onde de choc ne s'arretera helas pas sa progression avec le debut de la suivante en avril, d'autant que des milliers de promesses d'embauche de jeunes diplomes ont d'ores et deja ete resiliees egalement.

Pour en savoir plus sur cette lame de fond qui pourrait bien cisailler le Japon (scenario pessimiste) ou bien le rendre plus fort comme apres un vigoureux elagage (scenario optimiste) ne manquez surtout pas de parcourir l'article tres interessant publie ce jour par Bloomberg, un papier sans complaisance et qui ose donner des chiffres a faire se dresser les cheveux sur notre tete. Il est certain a en prendre connaissance, que nous ne sommes encore qu'au debut du tremblement de terre, et ce n'est que quand la terre aura fini de trembler que l'on pourra savoir combien en ont ete victimes.




Suicides, Homeless Ranks to Swell in Japan as Firms Slash Jobs

Homeless and suicide numbers in Japan may spike as manufacturers including Sony Corp., Panasonic Corp. and Honda Motor Co. fire thousands of workers to cut costs amid the country’s worst recession since World War II, unions said.

Some 400,000 temporary workers will lose their jobs by March, according to the Japan Manufacturing Outsourcing Association. Japan’s unemployment rate jumped the most in 41 years in December, to 4.4 percent from 3.9 percent a month earlier, as companies laid off an estimated 88,000 temporary staff.

Changes in labor law since 1999 have left a third of Japan’s workforce employed on short-term contracts offering little security and no unemployment benefits. Wages are often less than welfare payments and many temporary workers live in company dormitories, leaving newly unemployed also homeless, unions and activists say.

“Getting fired in Japan can also mean losing a place to live,” said Makoto Yuasa, head of Moyai, a support group for the jobless and homeless. “There’s not enough security or protection for people who lose their jobs.”

Then-Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi extended changes to labor laws in 2004 to let carmakers and other manufacturers use more temporary workers to help the country recover from almost a decade of economic stagnation. The policy undermined Japan’s so- called lifetime employment system, letting companies hire and fire to meet production needs.

Economy Grows

The changes coincided with Japan’s longest postwar economic expansion from February 2002 to October 2007. Excluding financial and insurance firms, corporate profits rose 58 percent between fiscal years 2001 and 2007, according to the Ministry of Finance.

Companies cut costs by hiring from staffing agencies that handle recruitment and training and pay any needed pension and social security contributions. The rolls of non-regular workers, including temporary and part-time staff, rose to 34.5 percent of Japan’s 55.3 million employed in September from 24.0 percent in 1999, labor ministry data show.

As the number of temporary workers increased, so did poverty levels as 4.3 million, or 8.1 percent of all Japanese households, earned less than 1 million yen ($11,200) in 2007, up from 3.1 million in 2001, according to ministry data. Workers on minimum wage in Tokyo earn 122,560 yen a month for a 40-hour week, less than the 167,170 yen per month paid to welfare households.

“It’s totally unstable, unlike anywhere else in the world,” Makoto Kawazoe, an official with the Tokyo Young Contingent Workers Union, said yesterday. “You can’t treat labor like raw materials and expect it to conform to a ‘just in time’ manufacturing system. Labor is live human beings who have to eat and survive.”

A Different Recession

The new face of Japan’s job market means the country will also experience this recession in a different way, according to Martin Schulz, a senior economist at Fujitsu Research Institute in Tokyo. Companies that used to cut wages when times were bad can now fire workers to offset declining earnings, he said.

Over the New Year, about 500 recently fired temporary workers set up a “tent village” in Tokyo’s Hibiya Park, two blocks from the Emperor’s palace, before the government moved them into welfare housing on Jan. 5th.

There’s no sign the layoffs will abate. Honda Motor Co. said it will axe all its 3,100 temporary jobs in April. NEC Corp. will cut its payroll by 20,000 by 2010 and Panasonic, the world’s largest maker of consumer electronics, said yesterday it will cut 15,000 jobs including full-time positions.

Jobless Suicides

Economic woes in Japan historically herald an increase in people taking their own lives in a society that already sees a suicide about every 15 minutes. Fifty-seven percent of the 33,093 who killed themselves in 2007 were jobless, police figures show.

“For political leaders the suicide rate is a sharp warning over policies,” Koichi Kato, a lawmaker for the ruling Liberal Democratic Party, said in an interview this week.

Prime Minister Taro Aso said on Jan. 28 the government will ease regulations barring non-regular workers from unemployment coverage. For example, Japan’s labor ministry plans to reduce the qualification period for benefits to six months in the same job from 12, starting April 1.

The one thing Japan can’t do is turn back the clock and ban companies from taking on temporary workers, Naohiro Yashiro, a professor in labor economics at the International Christian University in Tokyo, said in an interview yesterday.

“Returning to stricter hiring regulations won’t benefit workers, rather it would put further restrictions on a labor market already suffering from the economic downturn,” he said. “The government needs to make unemployment insurance not just compulsory but also beneficial to short-term workers.

‘‘Lay-offs are like accidents -- you need a secure, flat payment to ensure that you’ll get through it.’’

Il y a des personnes qui savent endormir les gens

Ce qui m'etonne le plus - sans m'etonner vraiment, que l'on entende bien ce que je veux dire - c'est que nombre d'affaires tout a fait legales etaient (et continuent d'etre pour beaucoup d'entre elles) uniquement des machines construites sur le modele elabore par Charles Ponzi (cliquer ici) sans que jamais ni fisc, ni repression des fraudes, ni aucun service de l'Etat ne se soit jamais rendu compte de rien. Comme par hasard, ce ne sont jamais ces affaires-la que l'on vient inspecter. Or au lieu de faire incessamment la tournee des PME pour leur appliquer des redressements fiscaux parfois inhumains (je connaissais une controleuse qui avait quitte son emploi apres une grosse depression nerveuse contractee a force de voir ainsi ses collegues ratisser des PME dont l'existence ne tenait qu'a un fil au point de les ruiner completement) on ferait bien d'examiner dans le detail chaque produit financier, chaque modele industriel pour verifier qu'il n'y a pas dans leur fonctionnement une escroquerie ou quelques vices caches. Impossible ? Et pourquoi grand Dieu ? On demande bien aux entreprises pharmaceutiques de prouver l'innocuite de leurs produits avant de les mettre sur le marche, non ?

En tout cas, je remarque que nombre d'arnaques ont ete menees sans accrocs jusqu'a l'age venerable de la retraite de leur initiateur. Et maintenant, c'est nous qui passerons pour des sans-coeurs de mettre en prison de ces gentils pepes... flingueurs.