Job Discussion Forums

[Doglover]

The General Union in Osaka has set up an online petition to complain about the non-enrolment of employees in shakai hoken by language schools...

http://www.ipetitions.com/campaigns/shakaihoken/

Please take a look and forward to anyone you think may be interested...

[Doglover]

Hi,

Please find attached the English and Japanese versions of an online
questionnaire currently being conducted by the Part-Time Teachers Union
based in Osaka - until the end of January 2006.

This union works very closely with the University Teachers Union (UTU) which
published a report on the working conditions of foreign teachers in Japanese
universities fairly recently. (see: http://www.utu-japan.org/) That report
was only conducted in English for foreign teachers. Previous surveys
conducted by the part-time-teachers union were- to the best of knowledge -
only conducted in Japanese....

Thus, the attached survey represents what I think is the first attempt to
gather data from both Japanese and foreign part-time university teachers
round the country - in an attempt to help both - and to motivate people to
re-consider their working conditions.

As background, and as Debito pointed out in his recently publicised article,
the unions petition government ministries every year to get the central
government to research and publicise data about employment conditions for
part-timers - and foreigners - in universities but every year, they refuse -
though at the negotiations I attended this year, I remember one person
replying that there maybe some data on it somewhere but he wasn`t quite
sure...and the general line is that there`s not enough evidence to warrant
the commissioning of a government report on the issue - which is why the
unions are going to a lot of effort to systematically gather evidence....

So please help this union by taking some time to consider, complete and
submit the questionnaire - preferably on-line. And of course PALE can
consider how it might so something similar...

Perhaps the first step is to clarify your actual employment status...

* Full-timers may have part-time university work on the side (they can take
part in the survey...)
* Part-timers may have no full-time jobs - and are juggling part-time
university jobs (they can take part in the survey...)
* Part-timers may think they`re full-timers but they`re not (like me: I work
35 hours a week, have an office, research grant, bonuses and other stuff yet
technically, I`m a part-timer - JOKIN TEKI NA HIJOKIN....which came a sa bit
of a shock a few years ago) (we can take also take part in the survey...)

Anyway, please take a look and forward it on to anyone you think may be
interested - regardless of nationality.


P.S. This is a Word Attachment. PM me if you want to fill in the questionnaire.

[wangtesol]

Do people understand the issue of shakai hoken?

I certainly did not when I first arrived in Japan. Coming from a country with universal healthcare, I just assumed that Japan had something similar, and they do, but the private English school industry is an unregulated industry, so company officials get away with not enrolling employees, and then they lie about their obligation to do so.

Health care for migrant teachers is better in Taiwan where a teacher pays around $5 US a month for full-servce care.