Eyes on Bank of Japan as unions announce wage hikes
TOKYO: The results of key wage hike negotiations in Japan will be announced Friday, with a win for workers expected to set the stage for a hotly anticipated shift away from the central bank’s ultra-loose monetary policy.
Wage growth has been sluggish in Japan for decades, and the government partly blames this for the economy’s woes.
But this year members of Japan’s largest trade union, Rengo, have demanded their highest average pay increase since 1994 in annual spring wage talks.
Rengo reports preliminary results of the bargaining later Friday, with hopes high after major firms including Toyota and Panasonic ceded fully to their workers’ pay demands.
Its announcement will be closely watched by economists looking for signs that the Bank of Japan could soon scale back its long-standing monetary easing policies.
The bank’s…
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