現代日本における失業対策の圧縮とその歴史的背景(大会報告・共通論題:格差拡大社会-史的接近と現状分析-)

抄録

Unemployment policy in Japan has undergone considerable change since 2000. The main characteristics of this change are the tendency towards deregulation and greater mobility of the labor market, common to many countries under globalization; but there are some characteristics particular to Japan such as the severe reduction of unemployment benefit and the continuing absence of a public direct employment policy. This change, based on the neoclassical theory, is also linked with Japan's historical experience. This paper, tracing the experience of unemployment policy since the First World War, tries to understand the significance of ongoing changes from a historical perspective. Our conclusion is that Japanese government has made too much of economic recovery to solve the unemployment problem in order to avoid increasing public expenditure for the unemployed and allow employers to behave freely. As a result of these features, the main target of unemployment policy has been limited to the lower income class of workers. These characteristics, which were not apparent through the period of economic development, have become clear as the unemployment rate grows higher.