Weak Japan Wage Results Offer Little for Kishida or BOJ
- Drop in real pay may discourage Kishida from calling election
- Continued wage decline shows stronger than expected inflation
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Japanese workers’ real wages continued to fall in April, even after reflecting some of the gains from a solid win in annual pay negotiations, in a disappointing result for both Prime Minister Fumio Kishida and the Bank of Japan.
Real cash earnings for Japan’s workers dropped 3.0% from a year earlier in April, slipping for the 13th month as overtime pay showed weakness, the labor ministry reported Tuesday. Economists had forecast a 2.0% decrease.