Japan set for largest ever minimum wage hike after panel proposal

“Raising wages, as I’ve repeatedly said, is one of the most important challenges for the Kishida administration.”
Kishida and the Bank of Japan are hoping that wage hikes can be sustained so that they generate more consumer spending that decisively lifts the world’s third-largest economy out of decades of stagnation.

Minimum wages are set by the government, while in the annual round of spring wage negotiations, corporate management and labour unions negotiate directly over salaries.

Japan’s largest labour organisation, Rengo, said this month that major companies had agreed to average pay hikes of 3.58% this year, the highest level in three decades. ($1 = 140.3500 yen)