Immigration News: January, 2005 - Volume 12

Japan, Korea

Japan is in its third year of economic recovery, but wages are flat or falling, largely because of the success of temporary employment agencies that provide part-time workers. Between 1997 and 2004, the percentage of part-time workers in Japan doubled from 15 to 30 percent, while the number of full-time workers fell by 4 million to 34.6 million. The major source of the decline in the average wage is the very large increase in the number of temporary, part-time and contract workers, marking an end to Japan's lifetime employment model.

Japan began to allow temporary workers in 1986, expanded the number of categories in which temporary jobs were permitted to 26 in 1999, and lifted almost all remaining restrictions in 2004. About 20 percent of Japanese manufacturers are hiring part-time workers.

Japan and the Philippines agreed to a free trade deal that should open Japan's labor markets to Filipino nurses (for up to three years) and also reduce trade barriers. The Filipinos, perhaps several hundred a year at first, will have to pass Japanese exams and undergo language training. Under one scenario, the Filipino nurses could work at low wages as caregivers while they studied Japanese to pass the language exam, but could stay in Japan and take the exam repeatedly over three or four years. Japan, which provides two-thirds of the Philippines Official Development Assistance, may use aid funds to establish Japanese language schools in the Philippines.

The nurses could add to the 286,000 Filipinos in Japan; they remitted $413 million in 2003. Japan has the third largest number of overseas Filipino workers, after the US and Saudi Arabia.

Japan will tighten the rules on the entry of foreigners with entertainer visas. Some 57,500 Filipinos, 98 percent women, who went to Japan as entertainers in 2003; some stay more than a year, and there were an estimated 100,000 in Japan at the end of 2004. Most Filipina "Japayuki" report earning $900 to $1,500 a month plus tips in Japanese clubs, with housing and food paid by their Japanese employers.

US government and human rights groups have criticized the entertainer program as a door to prostitution. Japan announced that it will require foreign entertainers to have completed at least two years of formal training in music, dancing or singing, or to have at least two years experience in the entertainment industry. The Filipino government counters that its Artist Record Book and Artist Accreditation Card systems are sufficient to ensure that those who go are legitimate entertainers; negotiations, especially over the entertainers currently in Japan, are ongoing.

Korea. South Korea has two programs that allow employers to hire migrant workers: the industrial trainee system and the work permit program. Started in 1993, the trainee system permits foreign workers to enter the country and receive technical training for one year, with conversion to worker status for two more years; employers must provide trainees with room and board. However, as unauthorized workers, trainees can earn higher wages, even if they have to find their own housing, and 60 percent of the 50,357 industrial trainees in August 2004 had run away from the employers to whom they were assigned.

In November 2004, a total of 186,000 of the 422,000 foreigners in Korea were illegal. Employers of illegal foreigners face fines of up to 20 million won (US$19,080) and up to three years in prison.

Since August 2004, foreigners can enter Korea as workers under the Employment Permit System, and 2,204 work permits were issued between September and November 2004 after Korean employers tried for at least one month to find local workers. Both the Labor and Justice Ministries are involved in deciding whether to issue work permits, but employers say they are satisfied with the new work permit system because foreign workers do not quit their jobs. Even though foreign workers must receive at least the Korean minimum wage, their costs are not too much higher than those of trainees because employers do not have to provide them with room and board.

Six Asian nations - the Philippines, Thailand, Vietnam, Mongolia, Indonesia and Sri Lanka - have signed bilateral agreements with Korea to provide up to 6,000 construction, farming and manufacturing workers each. Newly arrived migrants get a three-day orientation seminar before being sent to Korean employers, most of whom pay them the minimum wage of 640,000 won a month, but overtime pay can allow them to earn a million won a month.

Korean professionals continue to emigrate, with 4,600 leaving for Canada and 4,200 leaving for the US in 2003. Many of those leaving criticized the Korean education system, and going abroad for education often leads to settlement abroad. The annual Korean emigration fair in September 2004 drew 20,000 visitors, most in their 20s and 30s.

The Korean government announced plans to increase the number of foreign students from 17,000 to 50,000 by 2010 (www.studyinkorea.go.kr). Some 188,000 Koreans were studying abroad in April 2004.

Jerome Aning, "RP To Continue Deployment Of Entertainers To Japan," Philippine Daily Inquirer, December 23, 2004. Cheong Chul-gun, "Permits for migrants called a success," JoongAng Daily, December 13, 2004. Lee Sun-young, "Workers from six countries vie for Korean factory jobs," Korea Herald, December 3, 2004. David Pilling, "Despite three years of strong economic growth, salaries are falling as Japan's appetite for part-time labor grows," Financial Times, November 15, 2004.