【Aging, safety net and fiscal crisis in Japan】No.256: Reform of the public servant system is stagnant.

Figure 1 shows the trend of budget-based personnel expense for public servants. The total expense for national/local public servants fell from JPY 34,011 billion (US$ 315 billion) in 2000 to JPY 28,165 billion (US$ 261 billion) in 2005, as a result of the reduction in the number of national public servants. For example, 286,000 servants’ positions were reduced by making the postal business a public corporation in 2003, and another 133,000 servants by transforming national universities into independent administrative corporations in 2004. However, the reform has not progressed since 2015.

The government has formulated a rationalization plan to reduce the number of national public servants from 298,487 in March 2020 to 267,560 by March 2025. Meanwhile, the government submitted a bill to the Diet in 2020 to amend the law to raise the retirement age of national public servants from 60 to 65. This amendment draft was abandoned due to the fact that the government failed to deal with COVID-19 issues, and the Diet was confused by scandals involving the appointment of the Attorney General.

Through the COVID-19 turmoil, it has become clear that Japan is lagging behind in terms of digitizing its administrative services. For example, even after three months, the remittance work of providing each person with JPY 100,000 (US$ 925) has not been completed. Furthermore, even in July, the Tokyo metropolitan government cannot accurately grasp the number of new COVID-19 patients per day. Therefore, it is necessary to reform the public servant system as well as the digitization of administrative services.

Figure 1 Personnel expense of public servants

Source: Ministry of Finance & Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications