TOKYO- More than half of big Japanese companies are planning to raise wages this year, according to a Reuters monthly poll, meeting a key request from Prime Minister Fumio Kishida to help workers cope with surging consumer prices.
Kishida’s administration has repeatedly urged companies to make maximum efforts to lift employee pay, which has failed to keep up with the fastest inflation in 40 years. That push was boosted last week when Uniqlo operator Fast Retailing Co said it would raise wages by as much as 40 percent.
Ahead of spring “shunto” labor negotiations, managers at 24 percent of the companies polled said they planned on across-the-board bumps in base salary along with regularly scheduled wage increases. Another 29 percent said they would carry out regular pay increases only, while 38 percent were undecided.
“Prime Minister Kishida has been saying raise wages, raise wages, but the decision to hike pay isn’t done on the words of a prime minister or president,” said Masayuki Kubota, chief strategist at Rakuten Securities. “Rather it’s because a company needs better human resources to achieve its growth potential.”
“If the company isn’t competitive, raising wages translates just to higher costs that will only worsen its situation,” he added.
A total of 34 percent of firms said they planned wage increases of at least 3 percent, a jump from 10 percent in a Reuters survey in October.
