The government building housing the offices of the Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare Asahi Shimbun file photo Japan s inflation-adjusted real wages fell 2.6 percent year-on-year in October, the largest fall in seven years and four months, the labor ministry said in a report released December 6.
Real wages did not increase as the cost of living went up for the same month, even though nominal total cash earnings went up for the same month.
The decrease in real wages in October was the seventh consecutive drop from the same month a year ago.
The ministry spokesman said that nominal wages rose 1.8 percent year-on-year to 275,888 yen $2,015 for October, the 10th straight month of increase.
The consumer price index, which the ministry uses to calculate real wages, jumped 4.4 percent for the same month, the largest since 2014, when the consumption tax rate was raised to 8 percent from 5 percent.
Since June 2015, real wages have gone down 2.8 percent year on year due to a decline in bonuses and other special allowances, making it the largest slide in real wages since June 2015.
In 2020, nominal and real wages decreased by 1.2 percent from a year ago due to the novel coronaviruses.
A slight recovery was made the following year when nominal wages went up 0.3 percent and real wages rose 0.6 percent in 2021.
Real wages are returning to a declining trajectory this year, as the cost of living has gone up faster than the 1 to 2 percent growth in nominal total cash earnings.