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Results of 2003 Spring Wage Negotiations


June 5, 2003

Nippon Keidanren
(Japan Business Federation)

In this year's spring labor-management negotiations, a vast number of large companies indicated that they refused to raise their base wage and instead settled on just offering the standard annual increment. Moreover, the average amounts of the wage settlements of large enterprises remained mostly unchanged in comparison with last year's numbers. This spring's labor-management negotiations can be characterized by the following four attributes:

  1. More companies adopted wage-setting systems based on their ability to pay labor costs, abandoning the "follow-the-crowd" practice of setting wages in tune with those of similar firms. The rate of wage increases changed little over last year's figures, which were the lowest ever.

  2. Employee payments are being set from the perspective of total labor cost management, with more companies than ever basing their bonuses on their corporate performance. In addition, a larger number of companies have introduced performance-based formula for setting bonus amounts.

  3. Some companies have increased wages at a rate smaller than their rate for annual wage increments, suspended or delayed their annual increments, and/or cut their overtime pay rates to the legal minimum for a limited time.

  4. More companies are revamping their pay raise and wage-setting systems by shifting emphasis from seniority to performance.



Results of 2003 spring wage raise negotiations
(as of 5 June, 2003)
Major companies, weighted arithmetic average
Industry20032002
Number of
companies
Amount of wage
increase (yen)
Rate of
increase (%)
Number of
companies
Amount of wage
increase (yen)
Rate of
increase (%)
Non-ferrous metals 65,2661.78105,3351.85
Foods 166,1881.88166,4561.97
Textiles 185,3281.80165,3691.83
Paper and pulp 154,8101.53145,2601.69
Printing 33,8841.5834,2401.73
Chemicals (including ammonium sulfate) 335,5291.65325,5191.66
[ Chemicals ] [ 28 ][ 5,696 ][ 1.66 ][ 26 ][ 5,641 ][ 1.66 ]
[ Ammmonium sulfate ] [ 5 ][ 4,888 ][ 1.58 ][ 6 ][ 5,084 ][ 1.64 ]
Rubber 44,2341.4544,2231.44
Petroleum 4------6------
Cement 45,5351.8331,7830.65
Iron and steel 143,7001.23133,7001.23
Machinery 104,4381.36145,6041.75
Heavy electric machinery 1------1------
Automobiles 186,2171.91156,0371.89
Railway equipment 34,9801.6625,1181.68
Shipbuilding 135,8921.8595,9471.84
Commerce and distribution 45,3081.4255,9431.62
Railways 6------6------
Transportation 1------1------
Electric power 7------8------
Hotels 1------2------
Information and
communications
4------4------
Commercial broadcasting ---------9------
Gross Average 1855,391
( 4,893 )
1.65
( 1.57 )
1935,249
( 5,327 )
1.59
( 1.66 )
Note:(1) The survey covered 294 major companies in 22 industries.
(2) The wage raise figures include both base salary and annual increments.

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