The re-employment of women is one approach to the peculiarities of the Japanese labor market and to the Japanese patterns of employment management. Today, Japan's corporate personnel system is undergoing a fundamental change. In that context systems to re-employ women deserve special attention. Many working women find it difficult to continue working because of family responsibilities, such as childbirth, child care, the need to look after family members. There are three responses.
Some women wish to retire completely from the labor force.
This type seeks a more extended absence from work such that it becomes necessary to resign. She withdraws from the workforce temporarily, and then concentrates on the pressing problems at home before returning to work. When women resign from their companies to deal with their immediate problems at home and those problems are then resolved, the question of their reentry to the labor market becomes an issue. It is sometimes difficult to delineate clearly between re-employment and the continuation type. In both cases, there is continuity in that women return to the same companies after a period off work.