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(Applause) Good morning.

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So why Womenomics?

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Back in 1999, I decided

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to write a research report called "Womenomics",

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because I strongly believed and I do today,

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that part of a solution to Japan's 
myriad of structural challenges

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lies right in front of our eyes:

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half the population.

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What are some of these structural challenges?

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First and foremost is 
the D-word, demographics.

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Many of you are familiar with these statistics,

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but in case you are not, let me remind you.

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By the year 2055, in most of our lifetimes,

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the total population of this archipelago

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will shrink by one third.

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By that time, as you see,

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the percentage of the gray population

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will have doubled from 20% to over 40%.

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These statistics are scary

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and demographics are so severe that --

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did you know Japan is the only OECD country,

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where there are actually more pets than children?
(Laughter)

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I didn't make that up.

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I looked that up.

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And if you look at it globally, of course,

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Japan, the line is here in the red,

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the percentage of the population 
that is the workforce population.

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Of course demographics is a challenge 
for every developed economy,

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but Japan, as you can see, is going to be shrinking

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its workforce population faster than anywhere else.

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So what are the answers?
What are the solutions?

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Basically, as far as I can tell, 
there are only three.

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1. Raise the birth rate.

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2. Change immigration laws.

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And 3. again, use half 
the population more effectively.

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The first one I think the government has tried to fix,

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but unfortunately, many young Japanese people,

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many of you may be in this room,

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have decided to say no to marriage.
(Yes to the mic!)

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And as the ratio of unmarried Japanese rises,

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of course it is a little bit difficult 
to raise the birth rate, isn't it.

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2. Immigration.

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I personally believe this is inevitable,

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but it is likely to take a little bit more time.

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So that leaves us with the third,

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I think most practical near-term solution.

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Good news and bad news.

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First of all, good news is,

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Japan's female labor participation rate,

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women working today, has reached
a record high of 60%.

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I wrote my report 12 years ago

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and I am glad to see there has been progress.

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The bad news however is, 
on a global comparison

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this is where Japan ranks,

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well below most other advanced nations,

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especially in countries like Scandinavia,

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where that ratio is close to 80%.

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So what are the issues here?

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One is what I call 
the uniquely Japanese phenomenon

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called the "M字カーブ", the M-curve.

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What am I talking about here?

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If you look at this graph,

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and I know it is a little bit difficult
to look at graphs at this hour of the day,

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but bear with me, this is basically

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ages, age groups on the horizontal

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and the vertical is the percentage of women working.

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Now typically in any society,

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you leave school, you enter the workforce

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and you stay in the workforce until you retire.

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In most economies, that is 
sort of this hill-shaped curve,

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but in Japan you have this "谷",

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you have a valley between the ages of what,

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late 20s and late 40s.

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Now ladies and gentlemen, think about this.

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Those of you who are working,

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isn't the late 20s to late 40s period in anybody's career

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the most productive period of one's career?

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And Japanese women, for the most part,

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are MIA, missing in action.

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One of the bigger issues of course,

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as many of you know,

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because of the M-curve --
one of the reasons is, that

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many Japanese mothers don't work.

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In fact, 70% of Japanese mothers

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quit working after their first child.

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And internationally, if you look here,

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only about roughly a third of

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Japanese mothers with children under the age of 6

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are working. Compare that to Sweden,
close to 80%, the US, 60%, etc.

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Why don't more women work?

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These are four reasons:

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day care/nursing care, tax issues,

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diversity focus, and immigration.

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Let me focus though on 1. and 3.

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This is a very common topic of discussion.

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When we talk about womenomics in Japan,

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there is simply not sufficient daycare.

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Yes, the Japanese government 
has made some progress

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in expanding those facilities, but the reality is,

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the percentage of Japanese children 
under the age of 3

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currently in the care of a daycare facility

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stands at 28%.

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Look at France, 43%, or Denmark, over 60%.

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It's not also, by the way, daycare 
or childcare outside the home,

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what about inside the home?

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This of course entertained my husband to know,

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but the average number of hours,

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this is a government study,

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that fathers in Sweden, Norway, US, and Germany

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spend on childcare and household chores

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is over 3 hours a day.

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In Japan, 1 hour a day.

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And look at that red section of the Japan bar,

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that is 15 minutes on the children.

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OK, let me see gentlemen. 15 minutes.

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You probably spend more than 15 minutes, my guess,

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taking "お風呂", bath?

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Maybe more than 15 minutes a day watching TV?

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OK, let the truth be told.

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So there is a big issue 
with cooperation and mutual care,

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inside the home as well.

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Inadequate focus on diversity,

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this is to me a huge issue.

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The last 5 years, in most of the developed world,

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we have seen concrete progress.

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Change doesn't always happen from the bottom up,

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oftentimes it has to happen from the top down.

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To change things in society, you do need to put

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agents of change in leadership positions.

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So the percentage of Japanese managers is still 9%.

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This is the same ratio it was 5 years ago.

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Other countries are 35-50%.

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We need more role models.

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Interestingly, let's see, 25 years ago, 
the Japanese government

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actually passed the equal employment opportunity law, 
"均等法".

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Despite that, on average, Japanese women earn today

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still only two thirds that of their male counterparts.

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Now as you can see on this graph,

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gender wage gaps exist everywhere, not just Japan.

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But if you think about it,
if I am a Japanese woman

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and no matter how hard I work, 
no matter how hard I try,

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I know, that I am always going to be discriminated

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for pay and promotion. What am I going to do?

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I'm probably not going to continue, right?

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So this to me is a law, superficially,

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but it is not really enforced in the way it should be.

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Many people ask when I give 
these talks on Womenomics,

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"But does it really matter?"

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And I think, the statistics prove a resounding yes,

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because if you look at companies

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that have adopted explicit practices to promote diversity,

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for example, programs to support working mothers,

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or programs to ensure objective evaluation 
and performance metrics,

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the red bar shows you 
the average profit margin of those companies

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is higher than the blue bar of companies that do not.

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But let me tell you, the number 1 obstacle I encounter

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when I talk about Womenomics in Japan, is this.

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"But Matsui-san, if your thesis is right

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and we have more Japanese women working in society,

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is that not going to lower 
the already very low Japanese birthrate?"

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How many of you have heard that statement before?

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Yes, many people. Well, it is a very nice thesis,

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sounds good, but empirically this is false.

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Look at this graph.

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I am simply plotting: vertical axis is fertility rate,

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horizontal axis is women in the workforce.

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Don't bother with the dots, look at the red line.

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That is a positively sloped curve. In other words,

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the more women working in a country,

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the higher the birthrate, not the opposite.

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Look at Sweden, United States, 
United Kingdom, France, Australia.

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Now the Japanese in this audience don't believe me 
or don't believe these statistics.

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It is true in your own country.

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This is the "47都道府県", 47 prefectures,

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the slope, look at that, exactly the same.

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Okinawa, Fukui, Nagano, relatively higher 
female participation rate in the workforce

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and relatively higher birthrate.

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So what is the upside, 
if we could implement Womenomics?

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I know it is a bit of a dream, 
but let's pretend for a moment.

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If we could raise Japan's female participation rate,

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I showed you that at 60%, 
to match that of Japanese males at 80%,

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this is the potential upside to GDP:

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15%! 15% lift to Japanese GDP level.

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That to me is well worth it.

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Now what do we do finally? Four things.

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1. Change that mindset.

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Diversity Womenomics should not be 
an extracurricular activity,

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it has to be core to a company's bottom line strategy

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and in order to fulfil longer potential growth for an economy.

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2. Flexible work 
and objective evaluation practices.

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Flexible work, many people talk about 
flexible work for women.

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Think about it. If more Japanese women 
are not getting married,

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that must mean there are also lot of 
single Japanese men,

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who are single child, 
who have to take care of

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eventually their ageing parents, no?

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They are going to need time off.

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They are going to need more flexible work styles.

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So this is not a gender issue.

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Flexible work arrangements are for men and women.

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3. Deregulation of nursing, daycare, and immigration.

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Japan has agreed with the governments 
of the Philippines and Indonesia

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to welcome 1000 nurses. That is great.

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But if you want to stay beyond three years, guess what,

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you need to pass a national certification exam in Japanese

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to stay and keep your visa.

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Last February, 257 nurses took this test, 
3 nurses passed.

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If you are going to invite them, 
don't set the bar so high.

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Finally, a critical mass of female role models.

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This is very important.
I actually used to be a huge opponent to anything

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related to quotas, affirmative action.

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I have begun to evolve my thinking.

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The government of Norway, 2004, 
adopted a legal quota system,

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so that every publicly listed company in Norway

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had to have at least 40% 
of their corporate boards female.

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Now can you imagine if you are 
sitting in corporate Norway

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at that time, you said "No way!".

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There are not enough 
talented capable Norwegian women

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to fill our board's seats. It ain't gonna happen.

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Guess what happened. One year went by,

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two years went by. Today, most companies have

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fulfilled this legal quota of 40%.

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Why? Because the women were there.

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They just crawled out of the woodwork.

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They were lifted by other people and

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now they are in important positions of decision making.

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This is not impossible.

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And I think Japan in particular, 
given how far behind it is,

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maybe does need a little bit of an extra push

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to take the numbers up.

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And finally for those of you in this room who are female

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and there is lots of you and that is great to see,

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if you don't remember anything from my presentation today,

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remember one thing: 
there is no such thing as a glass ceiling,

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it is just a thick layer of men.

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Thank you very much.

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(Applause)