Japanese electronics retailer increases retirement age to 80

A Japanese company decided to push retirement age to 80, making it the first-ever instance in a nation that turned into a super-aged society already in 2006.

Yokohama-headquartered electronics retailer Nojima established a system to allow its employees to work until the age of 80, wrote the Nihon Keizai Shimbun. The changed scheme added 15 years to the existing retirement age of 65 for 3,000 workers on the payroll regardless of their roles and responsibilities. When they get eval‎uated for health and working attitudes every year after they turn 65, the results determine whether to extend their labor contract on a yearly basis. Further details have not yet been specified on types of work and compensations after the age of 65.

“We plan to consider ways to let healthy and enthusiastic workers even at an older age stay on the payroll to work until 80,” according to Nojima.

Starting from next April, a law will take into effect to guarantee job security to super-aged workers in Japan, one of the world’s super-aged nations where more than 20 percent of the population is 65 years old and above. The law requires businesses to give job opportunities to workers of 70 and below. Before it is implemented next year, Nojima intended to improve chances to make a better use of senior workers by preemptively increasing the retirement age to 80.


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