La cadena de tiendas Nojima contratará nuevos empleados de 80 años… o más

The electronics store chain Nojima has eliminated the age limit for hiring employees starting this month and is preparing to employ even people 80 years of age … or older.

The measure describes the labor shortage problem in Japan where more and more companies rely on people past retirement age to fill their vacancies.

With the lifting of the state of emergency due to coronavirus and the gradual recovery of the economy, the struggle to find workers is intense.

This year, zipper manufacturer YKK Group also lifted the retirement age to retain its workers.

Nojima has 3,000 full-time employees, about 10 are 75 or older after he revised his employment standards in July 2020. Now he wants to hire new staff 80 and older to work four times a week five-hour days daily for 120,000 yen (about $ 1,056) a month. The condition is to be healthy.

In the case of YKK Group, since last April its employees over 65 can continue to work full time for as long as they want. In some cases, they can even keep their salary if their bosses give them a high rating.

The labor needs are great. Nojima, for example, has to hire 870 new employees by March 2022, but it will barely reach 700.

At the national level, the labor problem is “serious”, commented the Nikkei. If there are no changes in the birth rate and the arrival of foreign labor, the economically active population, that is, people between 15 and 64 years old, will be 59.7 million in 2040. This represents 17.5 million people less in the estimate made by the National Research Institute on Population and Social Security. (RI / NI / PJ)