Labor minister admits overwork led to suicide of realty firm worker

The employee was engaged in work subject to the so-called discretionary working hours system, which rewards workers based on fixed overtime work instead of actual hours worked.

> While Kato has said his ministry never intended to hide the cause of the worker's death, opposition lawmakers argue that the incident could have harmed the government of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, which had sought to include the expansion of the discretionary system in a labor reform bill.

So Abe is trying to introduce a system which is into a labor reform bill which doesn't reward people for the number of hours that they worked, and which is responsible for so many people dying. A new low for this PM.

just blame it on sontaku.

Admits, admitted, admit,... are not they in deep disgust of themselves? The same thing, over and over and over again, and it keeps on repeating. Isn't it a definition of insanity?

A basic income to all would allow people the economic freedom to change jobs or start their own business rather than work for these bloodsuckers.

The easy thing to do is always blame everyone else but the worker himself.

I'm not saying companies are entirely blameless for work conditions, but at what point are we going to say hey, look, if a job is causing you that much stress, then it's time to leave? No one is forcing these people to overwork at gunpoint, it's a voluntary job, not prison.

oldman_13 hey, look, if a job is causing you that much stress, then it's time to leave

If you come from a Western European culture or especially an Anglo-Saxon one, then yes it would be a normal and comparatively easy response to the situation. Cultural norms in Japan however make it much harder for an individual to react in that way. Which is why the Japanese are going to have to evolve their own solution to this problem rather than just adopting a Western one.

at what point are we going to say hey, look, if a job is causing you that much stress, then it's time to leave? 

Leaving not only makes it harder to find another job (moving around jobs too frequently in Japan is frowned upon), the likelihood of ending up in the same position is quite high. The problem is an institutional one, not individual companies.

There's plenty of people in Japan that have and continue to work hard without killing themselves. To blame it on institutions or Japanese culture is a weak crutch. You can never legislate morality especially when it comes to corporations.

So what punishment did Nomura receive for breaking the law?