## (Issues with the Reemployment Pattern)

According to the Japan Institute of Workers' Evolution's "Survey on Treatment of Female Workers", when asked what is necessary in order to continue working in their present companies, the most common response from all women was "Systems and environments enabling mothers to work while raising children" at 51.7%. This was followed by "Work that is challenging and rewarding" at 50.5%.

"Consideration in work hours of child-care and nursing care" at 41.3%, "Colleagues and superiors to whom one can turn for advice" at 40.2%, "Workplace cultures and environments in which women are not discriminated against for marriage, childbirth, child-care, and so on" at 32.3%, and "Equal treatment of men and women and fair personnel evaluations" at 32.2% (Figure 48). This indicates a high percentage of responses in areas related to support for balanced work and home life and equal treatment. Looking at the answers by status of youngest child, the highest percentage answering "Systems and environments enabling mothers to work while raising children" was among women whose youngest child is not yet in elementary school, with the percentage dropping as the children got older and entered elementary or middle school. This pattern is repeated with "Consideration in work hours of child-care and nursing care", "Workplace cultures and environments in which women are not discriminated against for marriage, childbirth, child-care, and so on", "Not too much overtime", and "Flexible work hours". The support and systems needed for employment differ by life stage.

## (Preferable Support Measures)

According to the Japan Institute of Life Insurance's "Survey on Life Planning, Finance, and Insurance", the most common response on obstacles to full-time homemakers entering the workplace was "Burden of child care", followed by "Lack of jobs with appropriate work form and location", and "Burden of caring for a home" (Figure 49).

In addition, according to the "Report on Survey Research on Support Policies for Child rearing" commissioned by the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare, regarding changes in work following the birth of a first child, the most common response was "I will stop working", at 40.3%. This was much higher than the percentage answering "I want to stop working" (26.5%), indicating the difficulty of balancing work and childrearing.

In the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare's "Basic Survey of Employment of Women", the percentage of men taking child-care leave during 2003 was extremely low at only 0.44%, indicating the difficulty men have obtaining such leave.

Furthermore, according to the Statistics Bureau, Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications' "Labour Force Survey" the percentage of males working 60 or more hours weekly was 22.7% in the 30–34 age group and 24.0% in the 35–39 age group. These are the longest work hours of any age group, and this situation is taking men away from spending time with their children. In addition, looking at weekly work hours over time, there are age groups in which the percentage working 60 or more hours per week is increasing and age groups in which the percentage working less than 35 hours per week is increasing, so polarization is advancing as some age groups work more hours and some do not (Table 50).

Therefore, balancing work and home obviously requires the cooperation of men and women, but reexamination of ways of working by corporations and the undertaking of initiatives to support such balance are also needed.