How Japanese employment works

10 guides to the rules behind the numbers

Corpus publishes what Japanese companies actually pay and how they actually work, compiled from filings and government statistics. These pages explain the rules those numbers sit inside — what is required by law, what is only convention, and where the two are easy to confuse.

Pay, leave and hours

Each of these is paired with a benchmark page carrying the measured national figures.

How bonuses work in Japantwice a year, counted in months of salary, and not required by law How Japan's retirement lump sum workspaid once on leaving, sized by years of service, taxed on its own schedule Paid leave in Japanten days after six months, and five of them you must actually take Overtime and working hours in Japanan agreement is required first, and since 2019 there is a hard ceiling Parental leave in Japanup to a year, paid by insurance rather than the employer, and now disclosed Graduate hiring and starting salaries in Japanhired as a cohort, a year in advance, at a single published rate Women in management in Japanpublished because the law requires it, and hard to compare because "manager" is not defined

How employment itself works

The rules that shape everything above — what a salary figure covers, how secure a job is, and what Japanese companies are required to disclose.

What Japanese salary figures meangross, bonus included, and about 15–25% short of what arrives Employment contracts and dismissal in Japandismissal is void, not merely expensive — and much else follows from that What a Japanese annual securities report containsthe filing this site is built on, and the four employee numbers inside it

Work it out for yourself

What is left of a Japanese salary after social insurance and tax — the take-home calculator works it out from a gross annual figure, including the inhabitant tax that only starts in your second year.

The numbers

The measured figures behind these guides: Bonuses ・ Retirement lump sums ・ Graduate hiring ・ Paid leave ・ Overtime ・ Parental leave ・ Women in management ・ all benchmarks.

How to read these

Statute and convention are different things. Paid leave and overtime limits are statutory entitlements. Bonuses and retirement lump sums are not — they exist because the employer's own work rules create them, and an employer may lawfully offer neither.
Dates matter. Several of the rules described here were phased in between 2019 and 2025, often later for small and medium-sized employers. Each guide gives the date.
These are summaries, not legal advice.