Non-regular Employees’ Work, Lives, and Related Policy Issues

Abstract

Structural reform has led to deregulation in many sectors, including employment, and supermarkets are one typical example. This paper, focusing on supermarkets, elucidates the structural reform of personnel systems and employment structures resulting from changes in working time regulations as well as non-employment-related deregulation in areas such as business hours and new store openings. Since repeal of the Large-scale Retail Store Act, supermarkets have faced longer business hours and harsh competition. They have responded by changing their employment structures. As a result, contracted working hours of part-time workers have been shortened and the number of hours worked under contract has been linked to the degree of difficulty of work content. Contracted work hours long enough to provide social security and pension coverage have been made available to high-ranking part-time workers performing managerial-level work duties. At the same time, regular employees have taken on the burdens of management and business administration duties, requiring that they work without restrictions on work time or job relocation. This employment strategy effectively excludes regular workers engaged in reproductive labor from the core regular workforce. The resulting work style has become impossible for both male and female workers.