The “Public Sector Non-Regular Women’s Network” (Hamunet) held a press conference in Kasumigaseki on September 16, releasing survey results on non-regular workers employed by national and local governments. Among respondents, 46% reported annual employment income under ¥2.5 million, and 94% said they feel anxious about their future. A newly added item this year — “no hope for pregnancy or child-rearing prospects” — drew responses like “I’ve given up on having children.” On 5ch threads, discussion ranged from fact-checking the funding source for parental leave benefits and whether non-regular workers are enrolled in employment insurance, to self-responsibility arguments aimed at the “ice age generation,” and clashes over how the social security burden should be split between working-age people and the elderly.
The “Public Sector Non-Regular Women’s Network” (Hamunet), a group made up of non-regularly employed public workers, held a press conference on September 16 at the Kasumigaseki press club for health and labor reporters in Tokyo, presenting survey results targeting non-regular workers at national and local government bodies.
46% of respondents had annual employment income under ¥2.5 million, and 94% said they feel anxious about their future. While some municipalities have improved pay and leave systems, the survey once again highlighted issues such as low wages, job insecurity, and treatment gaps compared with regular employees.
This is the sixth year the survey has been conducted. For the first time, it included “no hope for pregnancy or child-rearing prospects” as an option among workplace concerns. Free-response answers included comments such as “I’ve given up on having children.”
Source: news.yahoo.co.jp / Original article here
9AnonymousSep 17, 2026 07:39
I'm 53, pulling in about ¥14 million a year, an average guy with a receding hairline, nothing special about me — but I have zero sympathy for the bottom rung of my own generation. I know from being the same age that the guys on the "ice age generation" threads whining "it's because of the ice age" are just blaming the era and society for their own lack of effort. It's been 30 years since then. What exactly have the ones at the bottom been doing this whole time?
112AnonymousSep 17, 2026 08:13
Re: #9
This copypasta's income keeps creeping up every year, huh lol
13AnonymousSep 17, 2026 07:41
Getting paid without working, lol — that's insane
54AnonymousSep 17, 2026 07:53
Re: #13
Right? lol
146AnonymousSep 17, 2026 08:19
Re: #13
Normally that'd be true, but if the government is serious about fighting the birthrate decline, I think pregnant women should temporarily be made special civil servants with their living costs guaranteed by the state. Scrap the Children and Families Agency and redirect its budget — wouldn't that cover the funding?
19AnonymousSep 17, 2026 07:43
I always thought non-regular public sector jobs were the kind of work chosen by people who are married or a bit older. It's a choice between the job you actually want and the pay, but I think most people end up choosing the pay over their dream job. In the end, you can't live on dreams.
27AnonymousSep 17, 2026 07:45
Re: #19
Normally that'd be retirees, grandpas and grandmas
40AnonymousSep 17, 2026 07:48
Re: #22
Could you apply that to future generations instead of the current ones? Today's elderly worked Saturdays too, worked themselves to the bone as so-called "corporate slaves" (shachiku) to get where they are now — and they're the ones who have to clean up after young people who get two-day weekends and cry "power harassment," "sexual harassment," "my mental health got wrecked," and get every kind of special treatment. Besides, plenty of today's elderly are still working. Shouldn't getting NEETs into the workforce come first?
52AnonymousSep 17, 2026 07:51
Re: #40 Re: #1
The weight of the fiscal burden of social security is the real issue — cut taxes, and rate hikes or a weaker yen push prices up and squeeze the working generation; don't cut taxes, and their income gets extracted like under the old "50% tax, 50% keep" feudal system, squeezing them either way. Elderly people whose healthy life expectancy has stretched out, who could work but don't, living it up on social security money and traveling around — they're today's aristocrats, today's court nobles, today's feudal lords. People like that are the reason social security doesn't reach those who genuinely need it, while the working generation gets squeezed like peasants under that old system. The working generation should be raising their voices against these modern-day lords.
77AnonymousSep 17, 2026 08:02
Re: #52
Social security is exactly what child-raising households need most
98AnonymousSep 17, 2026 08:09
Re: #77
It's not meant to let people who could work — thanks to longer healthy life expectancy — but choose not to, live it up instead. The working generation should be raising their voices against these modern-day lords who could work but don't, and just play around on social security money.
107AnonymousSep 17, 2026 08:12
Re: #98
Lower social insurance premiums only for people 30 and under and for child-raising households — and actually raise them for single people. That's the way to go.
99AnonymousSep 17, 2026 08:09
For regular salaried workers, parental leave benefits come out of employment insurance, but public servants aren't enrolled in employment insurance, so they don't get it that way. As a stopgap, regular (permanent) public servants get parental leave pay from tax funds, but non-regular ones don't — is that how it works?
109AnonymousSep 17, 2026 08:13
Re: #99
Leave benefits wouldn't be paid out that way — though there's sometimes a payment from the mutual aid association (kyosai kumiai)
120AnonymousSep 17, 2026 08:15
Re: #99
Public servants are enrolled in employment insurance too
110AnonymousSep 17, 2026 08:13
Re: #98
Elderly people getting a decent pension are people who paid social insurance premiums for a long time and supported society — companies have also contributed a substantial amount
116AnonymousSep 17, 2026 08:14
Re: #110
That's exactly why we should raise the elderly's out-of-pocket share for medical and nursing care
138AnonymousSep 17, 2026 08:18
Re: #116
Everyone becomes elderly eventually though. The question is how long a society where tax-exempt people come out ahead can actually keep going
161AnonymousSep 17, 2026 08:22
Re: #116
Didn't an actress in her 40s pass away recently? People die of illness normally even in their 40s. We need to raise the burden while people are still of working age.
157AnonymousSep 17, 2026 08:21
My parents had me as an only child from a late-in-life birth back in the Showa era. My mother said she needed her own time, and we still managed a reasonably comfortable life. As for me, the kid — I have zero interest in having children, so I'm living comfortably DINK-style (Dual Income, No Kids). I'm turning 40 this year, and I wonder if mine is actually the cutting-edge lifestyle (background included: only child, born to older parents).
167AnonymousSep 17, 2026 08:24
Re: #157
Getting married and staying childless really is the way to live with the most breathing room.
185AnonymousSep 17, 2026 08:28
Re: #167
What's the point of the marriage system then? A couple with no children is pointless.
194AnonymousSep 17, 2026 08:30
Re: #167
I really can't forgive DINKs. DINKs and single people should be taxed hard.
179AnonymousSep 17, 2026 08:26
48-year-old man here, regular (permanent) public servant, want to get married but can't find anyone. I want kids, so is there anyone 39 or under who wants to marry me??
188AnonymousSep 17, 2026 08:29
Re: #179
No way that's happening. Just go raise an adopted kid.
190AnonymousSep 17, 2026 08:29
Re: #179
That's way too big an age gap, it's hopeless.
205AnonymousSep 17, 2026 08:33
Re: #185
Is there any point to a life that doesn't produce descendants?
210AnonymousSep 17, 2026 08:34
Re: #205
There's a point if you end the negative spiral with your own generation.
219AnonymousSep 17, 2026 08:36
Re: #205
If your wife isn't working full-time, there are upsides — you can put her on your dependent coverage, you can still get the "Category 3" pension benefit (spousal exemption for dependents of insured workers) for now, and you save on food, housing, and utility costs.
232AnonymousSep 17, 2026 08:39
Why are you working a non-regular job?
242AnonymousSep 17, 2026 08:42
Re: #232
Non-regular public servants actually get bonuses, you know — unlike part-time workers in the private sector who get nothing
243AnonymousSep 17, 2026 08:43
Re: #232
Because I want to suck on the tax teat
Background and Points of Debate
This is the sixth survey conducted by Hamunet, and the fact that “no hope for pregnancy or child-rearing prospects” was added as an item for the first time this round hints at a shift in the circumstances facing non-regular public servants. On 5ch threads, opinions were split even over basic facts — whether non-regular public servants are enrolled in employment insurance, and where the funding for parental leave benefits actually comes from — underscoring how the system’s own complexity breeds misunderstanding. It’s also notable how discussion of non-regular workers’ treatment expanded into self-responsibility arguments about the “ice age generation” and clashes over social security burdens between working-age people and the elderly — a very 5ch-style drift from one survey’s findings into generalized generational conflict.
※This article is excerpted and summarized from the 5ch (News Express+) thread ““No Pay During Parental Leave,” “I Gave Up on Having Kids” — Nearly Half of Non-Regular Public Servants Earn Under ¥2.5 Million a Year… Survey Reveals Harsh Reality.”
