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The story
According to the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare’s “FY2025 Basic Survey on Wage Structure,” people aged 65 and older who are still working earn an average monthly income of ¥285,300. Broken down by industry, the gap between the highest-paying sector for ages 65-69 — education and learning support (¥420,900) — and the lowest-paying sectors is nearly ¥200,000. The original article also notes that high earners like university professors are pulling the average up. On 5ch, the discussion kicked off with someone lamenting “My monthly income is ¥170,000 — nowhere close,” then spread to cover the pay gap between rural and urban areas, take-home pay for assistant section chief-level employees, and minimum wage levels. Toward the end, some posters argued that reports should include the median alongside the average.
(Omitted)
Monthly income for ages 65-69 varies by nearly ¥200,000 depending on industry
From here, we’ll use the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare’s FY2025 Basic Survey on Wage Structure to check how much people aged 65 and older are actually earning. This is the same 2025 survey data used for the employment figures.
Source: news.yahoo.co.jp / Original article here
What people said
That's just how it is in the countryside.
That's really just down to your own effort… Anyway, change jobs.
If you take a side job you'd easily hit that. Full-time plus 6 hours of side work gets you to about that amount.
Soon we'll all be working until 75.
By the time the Ice Age generation (those who entered the job market during Japan's 1990s-2000s hiring freeze) hits retirement age, you'll probably need to wait until 70 to get full pension benefits \(^o^)/
If you cause a traffic accident and kill ("56" is slang using number readings to spell out 殺す, "kill," dodging word filters) the other person, you'll end up living like that overnight. Or if a fire you start burns down your house and the neighbors', you're instantly poor. Or if you get terminal cancer or severe diabetes, your life falls apart in a flash. There are plenty of other pitfalls too. A kid like you probably can't understand that though.
That wouldn't happen. What do you think insurance is for?
Apparently university professors are included in this, and they're the ones dragging the average up.
That's right. A university professor is roughly equivalent in rank to a section-chief-level national civil servant. Retirement age is 65 at national/public universities, but some private universities keep people on until around 70.
There's a long tradition of private universities hiring professors who've retired from national universities. You'd think it's just amakudari (the practice of retired officials landing cushy post-retirement jobs), but apparently in the sciences they bring job placements for students with them, so it's win-win.
That's outdated thinking aimed at the Ice Age generation. With the birthrate falling and labor shortages now, the plan should be to work until 75 to ease the burden on social security, so you don't have to worry about money right before you die. Just look at the population pyramid — there's no way the working generation can properly fund the Ice Age generation's pensions.
Take-home pay of ¥80,000 for full-time work? Must be a 5-day weekend schedule \(^o^)/
Depends on the job.
Nah, that's about normal for a small or mid-size company out in the countryside. Take-home of ¥220,000 probably means a gross of around ¥300,000. Add two bonuses of ¥500,000 each and you're at roughly ¥4.5 million a year — plenty solid for the countryside.
Seriously? No wonder the birthrate is falling.
No, with that much you can buy a house and a car and support kids. Your wife might have to work too, though.
Don't be fooled — an annual income of ¥4.5 million with ¥220,000 monthly take-home is about what a rank-and-file employee with no title makes, even out in the countryside. A section chief normally pulls in around ¥4.8 million a year. Department manager class: ¥5.2 million. Division head: ¥6 million. Managing director: ¥7 million. Senior managing director: ¥7.8 million. President: ¥8 million. That's roughly the scale even in the countryside.
Apparently if you've got an electrician's license, even part-time work pays ¥20,000 for half a day and they still can't find enough people. I've heard inspection work, not just construction, is also short-staffed and rough.
Even earning ¥450,000 at 80, he's probably not spending it — he's likely working so he can leave it to you. That's admirable. Meanwhile my own dad has about ¥2 million in stocks but apparently has no intention of gifting any of it to me while he's alive. He used to have around ¥7 million but sold it off to cover living expenses. He's been jobless for about 10 years but still gets ¥170,000 a month in pension.
Nah, that's way too little. Even in the countryside, that's short by a million yen.
If you check job listings at Hello Work (Japan's public employment agency) out in the countryside, ¥250,000 a month is totally normal.
You really need at least ¥200,000 take-home as a bare minimum. They should set a minimum for base pay too.
Even this is a big improvement, honestly. Back in the bad days, ¥180,000 or even ¥150,000 a month was the norm.
Alright then, my minimum wage is ¥1 million.
Are you that bitter about being below average?
The median is just a number counted up from the bottom — it's a figure made up of nothing but losers. What good would knowing that even do you?
Even unemployed, you'll still owe resident tax next year. And more to the point — how are you planning to live with no job?
Even as a tax-exempt household, they'll still take nursing care insurance premiums and National Health Insurance. And if you own your home, property tax too.
Background and Key Points of This Discussion
The figures behind this story come from the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare’s “Basic Survey on Wage Structure,” an official statistic published annually based on reports from employers. Averages are easily skewed by high earners, and as pointed out in the thread, high-paying occupations like university professors can pull up an entire industry’s average. Retirement age for faculty at national and public universities is around 65, while some private universities keep instructors on beyond that — one factor pushing up the monthly income figure for the “education and learning support” industry. Meanwhile, most posters in the thread reacted to the gap between the ¥280,000 average monthly income figure and their own take-home pay, with the disconnect from the lived experience of workers at rural and small-to-midsize companies driving much of the discussion. The calls for reporting the median alongside the average also have some merit as a point about statistical literacy — a reminder that averages alone can obscure the real picture.
*This article is compiled from excerpts and a summary of the 5ch (Breaking News Plus) thread “Monthly Income for Working People Aged 65 and Older Is “¥285,300.” How Much Does It Vary by Industry? The Highest-Paying Sector Is “¥420,000”.”
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