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source from：WSJ
WORLD
Japan Moves to Lure More Foreign Workers
Abe pledges to deliver the world’s fastest permanent-residency cards for skilled migrants
By PETER LANDERS and YUKA KOSHINO
June 8, 2016 3:31 a.m. ET
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TOKYO—Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s government is easing the path for foreign workers, with new policies that include a pledge to deliver the world’s fastest permanent-residency cards for skilled migrants.
A set of immigration measures, including that one, was buried amid dozens of ideas released last week in Mr. Abe’s annual list of policy changes. The government also said it planned to bring in more workers for understaffed nursing homes and 2020 Tokyo Olympics construction projects.
And it promised to raise the proportion of foreign students in Japan who stay in the country to work after finishing their studies. That figure, which is currently around 30% according to a labor ministry official, is targeted to rise above 50%.
Mr. Abe’s ruling Liberal Democratic Party incorporated the ideas in its platform for parliamentary elections in July, saying that in some areas of society, “grave effects are emerging because Japanese people alone are insufficient for the workforce.” It said a “large increase in foreign workers is anticipated.”
Many details remain to be worked out, and none of the steps would clear the way for broad migration of unskilled workers. That notion still raises concerns in Japan about possible crime or social unrest, although police figures show crime by foreigners has fallen in recent years even as their numbers rise.
The backdrop to the immigration debate is Japan’s long struggle to grow consistently, a goal Mr. Abe has been unable to achieve. Part of the problem relates to the workforce, which fell as Japan lost nearly a million people between its 2010 and 2015 national censuses. The population now stands at about 127 million people.
Toshihiro Menju, a managing director at the Japan Center for International Exchange, has called for more immigration, but warned that bringing in skilled foreigners would require social changes beside government measures. “There aren’t the right structures in place among Japanese companies and in society to accept” foreign workers, he said.
Japan has long made it relatively difficult for foreigners to get work permits, especially those who lack specific skills. Surrounded by water, the country has generally been able to keep out unwanted migrants, avoiding issues that have roiled politics in the U.S. and Europe. The difficulty of learning Japanese and getting acclimated to the local culture is another barrier.
The program for giving permanent residency to highly skilled professionals began in 2012, and only 4,347 people took advantage of it through the end of 2015, the Ministry of Justice said. “Perhaps Japan isn’t attractive enough as a place to live permanently,” Mr. Menju said.
But with the native-born population declining, Tokyo increasingly sees the low number of foreign workers as a problem. It has expanded job-matching services for foreign students in Japan, who can work nearly 30 hours a week. That helped raise the number of foreign workers to 907,896 as of last October, a 15% increase over the previous year, according to labor ministry figures.
Japan’s foreign workers make up slightly less than 2% of its workforce. By comparison, official figures show about 11% of the U.K. workforce doesn’t hold U.K. citizenship, and in the U.S., 17% of workers are foreign-born, a figure that includes naturalized citizens.
Mr. Abe’s proposal for a Japanese green card—which borrows American terminology for permanent residency—says it would be “the fastest such system in the world.” It doesn’t specify how fast that would be. Currently, skilled workers in areas such as engineering or finance must live in Japan for at least five years before applying for permanent residency.
Business leaders such as Takeshi Niinami, chief executive of beer and beverage maker Suntory Holdings Ltd., have called on Mr. Abe to loosen immigration restrictions as a way to jump-start the economy. Mr. Niinami has said a path to green cards should also be opened for technical interns, a class of workers mostly from Asian nations who currently must return home after three or five years.
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