Japan Press Weekly

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2013 January 9 - 15 [LABOR]

Large manufacturers cut jobs and increase internal reserves in past 20 years

While cutting nearly one million workers, large manufacturing companies in Japan increased their internal reserves by more than 20 trillion yen in the 20 years from 1992 to 2011, the financial ministry’s statistics showed.

In manufacturing corporations with a capital of more than one billion yen, the number of employees dropped from 3,917,378 in FY1992 to 3,086,146 in FY2011, according to the statistics.

The amount of earned surpluses, which make up the main part of their internal reserves, increased by 50% from 44.8 trillion yen to 67.0 trillion yen, and dividend payments grew from 16.0 trillion yen to 41.9 trillion yen during the same period of time.

Large companies in the electronics and information industries are now promoting layoffs of 130,000 employees. They should rather use a portion of their internal reserves to maintain employment.