Family members back home of foreign workers employed in Japan will be provided health insurance covers by the employer company.
This new initiative has been started by the local government of Yamanashi prefecture and a few others. This move is being read as another effort to lure overseas workers to their communities. Such initiatives are becoming fiercer not just between Japan, South Korea and Taiwan, but also within Japan.
Normally only the foreign workers employed in Japan are covered by the country’s national health insurance programme in Japan.
In the new move, however, initially kickstarted for workers from Vietnam, Tokio Marine Insurance Vietnam is insuring the relatives of such workers in their home country while Vietnamese workers on the payroll of businesses in the prefecture will sign as the policy holder.
The annual premium is JPY26,000 ($173) per relative. According to news reports the insurance for relatives in home country will cover effectively 90% of medical costs the insured person will have to pay.
According to the conditions of the policy if an employer contributes the premiums for at least 75% of the foreign workers employed, the employer qualifies to receive subsidies amounting to half of the contribution made from the prefectural government. This is a private insurance policy and has no connection to Japan’s public health insurance programme.
This move of the prefecture governments has, however, met with stiff resistance from the local residents. The local governments, are, however, steadfast in their decision on this initiative. The local governments say use of public funds for the premiums will help local businesses struggling to secure manpower for survival in view of rapidly declining population.
According to Japan’s Immigration Services Agency as of the end of 2024, about 3.77m foreigners lived in Japan, an increase of 10.5% as compared to 2023.
A survey conducted by Asahi Shimbun in October 2024 revealed that the nation’s 47 prefectures, including Tokyo, as well as 20 ordinance-designated cities with a population of 500,000 or more, have been hit by decades of depopulation and are growing anxious about the country’s policy involving blue-collar foreign workers.
Japan currently has a technical intern training system, introduced in 1993 and terminating in 2027. It prohibits foreign workers from changing jobs during their stay in Japan. This is scheduled to be replaced by a new regulation that will allow trainees to move on to a new job if they work for a certain period of time in the country.
An estimate about Japan’s population predicts that the share of foreigners in Japan might account for 10% of the total population in around 2050 if the current pace of the growth continued. This growth will be coupled with a sharp drop in the number of Japanese residents.