Survey on technical trainees' financial situation in Japan begins

Japan has commenced a survey to grasp the financial situations of foreign technical trainees as money problems seem to be the reason many abruptly leave their host firms, a government official said.

I wonder what conclusion the survey, and expert panel and discussion meetings will come to.

Could have saved the costs and time: Many of the trainees are taken advantage of because of their status and have wages illegally witheld, unpaid overtime and other forms of egregious wage theft.

Action plan:Urge companies to please follow the rules and be more careful.

Fixing this profoundly flawed program is easy:

1) Require the firms to comply with and issue internationally recognized industrial certifications, which is normally how "transferring skills" to other countries is accomplished. Who in their right mind would do a 2-year training course and at the end of it not receive any kind of diploma, etc? And who would hire a skilled industrial worker lacking certifications?

2) Publish and tell the media the names of firms involved in cases where abuses take place.

This ain't rocket science!

Even when this survey concluded, no mistake were done during collection and processing. There is no guarantee that they will followed up survey result.

https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2019/01/13/national/japan-wage-data-errors-undermine-trust-government-indicators-poll/

It is the first survey on expenses these trainees shoulder since the law on the protection of technical trainees came into force in November 2017,

It just 24 years late.

https://asia.nikkei.com/Economy/Japan-s-foreign-intern-program-balloons-as-industries-seek-labor

Some of them even got unpaid for their overtime.

https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2020/08/21/national/social-issues/trainees-hiroshima-overwork-unpaid-overtime/

"There are cases in which those runaway trainees engage in illegal labor and crimes such as theft. It is essential to implement measures to reduce the number of trainees who disappear from their workplaces," the official said.

Plan 2:Shift the focus from the structural problems with the program and companies' malfeasance and onto "we need closer inspection to make sure those dangerous foreigners are following the rules".

Those who disappeared stood at about 3,300 in 2021 as of June, with Vietnamese accounting for the largest number.

Pray tell, how do they "disappear?"

YubaruToday  08:15 am JST

Those who disappeared stood at about 3,300 in 2021 as of June, with Vietnamese accounting for the largest number.

Pray tell, how do they "disappear?"

Easy. They just turn off their J-govt LowJack tracker like everyone else. All these govt morons know how to do is paperwork. They are the Bubba (from Forrest Gump) of bureaucracy: you collate the paper, staple the paper, fax the paper, etc. etc.

This is a positive development but doing a survey from now means a lot of time has been lost. I look forward to the results confirming what everybody already knows about the siuation of the trainees.

Of course, they disappear, have no money, but will now fill in the survey blanks and leave their IP and location data with joy. lol

The "relocation" racket needs to end. These poor folk come over here with the hope of making some money for themselves/their families back home, but instead they arrive and are automatically plunged in to heaps of debt by these awful middlemen companies. Scum of the earth.

Trainees are paid ¥200-¥250,000 per month gross. Subtract income tax, ward tax, health insurance and pension and they are down 50% before they even get their salary. Then add rent, utilities and food and they are broke every month. They become financial prisoners.

"In Japan, thousands of technical trainees leave their host companies without notice every year seeking better wages, among other reasons, as many of them start their lives here heavily in debt due to the huge expense of entering the country."

Except that in other countries, the governments seek the "coyotes" who traffic in human smuggling, whereas here the government subsidizes them, then says, "Well... we have no say about who companies sub-contract to, so our hands are tied, but we will ask the companies to look into the companies they sub-contract to and sternly ask them not to do anything illegal". This program is one of the key reasons Japan is pretty much the worst human rights offender in Asia in terms of human trafficking. And a SURVEY? Even if they get honest results -- and people who are under the thumb of the yaks or yak-like treatment will NEVER answer honestly, if at all -- they will in the end just say they don't need foreign input into how things are run. This is like China conducting in internal investigation on how it treats minorities and promising transparency and action.

"There are cases in which those runaway trainees engage in illegal labor and crimes such as theft. It is essential to implement measures to reduce the number of trainees who disappear from their workplaces," the official said.

I can tell you what the officials will do. Require the trainees to submit a paperwork every week to prove that they are still with the employer or their visa will be cancelled.

Paperwork is the Japanese solution to everything.

The "trainees" know exactly what they are getting into. Come to Japan as a "trainee" immediately start looking for better paid work often for a slightly dubious company. Save as much as possible before returning to their home country with their relative wealth. Are they sometimes victims? Sure but often quite willing victims. At least in the sense that they know they are here to do the dirty, low paid jobs Japanese don't want to do.

https://www.yolo-japan.com/en/recruit/job/details/4385

What a waist of time, none are allowed into the country at the moment so what are they trying to achieve?

@Mr Kipling

The "trainees" know exactly what they are getting into

No they don't

. Come to Japan as a "trainee" immediately start looking for better paid work often for a slightly dubious company. Save as much as possible before returning to their home country with their relative wealth. Are they sometimes victims? Sure but often quite willing victims. At least in the sense that they know they are here to do the dirty, low paid jobs Japanese don't want to do.

Have you interact with any of them? They are not white collar, with limited education, ability to find appropriate information that they really need. They have no clue with actual reality with Japanese trainee program before they arrived to Japan. Most of their broker only provide good thing about nice thing they'll get when they arrived in Japan.

https://mainichi.jp/english/articles/20200730/p2a/00m/0na/014000c

It's called BREAKINGOUT of the chains around their necks.

Good for them and I hope they find a better life in Japan like a normal citizen would live.

Will the undertaking of the survey, including tabulation and release of the results, be overseen by an impartial, recognised international third party? If not, then we must take the results with a grain of salt.

I know for sure that some do not really have problems with money but quit their job hoping to find one with a better wage. But by doing that, they find a job out of the scope of their visa and expose themselves to problems