Summary: Nearly one million workers in Japan are being illegally excluded from Kosei Nenkin, losing pension coverage they’re entitled to. Employers are dodging their obligations through tactics like cutting hours, misclassification, and outright non-enrollment — even in universities. Weak government enforcement means the problem is growing, but the General Union is fighting back with legal action, direct negotiations, and public campaigns to protect workers’ futures. 

According to the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare (MHLW), around 970,000 workers aren’t enrolled in Kosei Nenkin (Employees’ Pension Insurance) despite being eligible. Unlike Kokumin Nenkin (National Pension Insurance), where individuals pay the full premium, Kosei Nenkin requires employers to pay half — the real reason so many companies dodge it. 

The government calls this “progress,” claiming the problem has been halved in nine years. But nearly one in every 40 eligible people being denied legal pension coverage isn’t progress — it’s a scandal. Employers are stealing from their workers’ futures to avoid their obligations. 

For the General Union, this is vindication. We’ve been fighting since 2002 to expose this widespread abuse, filing cases, running hotlines, and warning that avoidance was rampant. Now the government’s own numbers confirm what we’ve said all along — and the real figure is likely far higher. 

When the Courts Ruled and Nothing Changed 

In 2015, the union supported and funded a case at the Tokyo District Court on behalf of an Interac ALT with a suspicious 29.5-hour contract, filing the suit against the Japan Pension Service (日本年金機構). We had reported to the agency that thousands of ALTs were being kept below the threshold to avoid enrollment, yet they refused to act. 

The court found the worker actually worked 35 hours a week and ordered enrollment — but the agency only enrolled that one person, leaving the wider abuse untouched. This wasn’t a one-off — dispatch companies and English schools across Japan were using artificial hour limits, misclassifying staff as “subcontractors” or “independent contractors,” and other schemes to dodge contributions, while enforcement agencies looked the other way. 

Today, some of those workers are turning 65 and finding huge gaps in their Kosei Nenkin record, meaning reduced or missing benefits. We’ve won compensation in similar cases and are still pursuing legal action against companies with long histories of avoiding enrollment. 

The Enforcement Charade 

The MHLW admits that as of March 2025, 150,000 companies are suspected of non-compliance. That’s 150,000 law-breaking businesses — and the government’s answer is more surveys. 

The pattern echoes Japan’s lost pension records scandal: an initial “small problem” that turned out to be massive. We should assume today’s figures are the low-end estimate of a much bigger crisis. 

Employers who fail to enroll eligible workers face up to six months in prison or ¥500,000 in fines under the Employees’ Pension Insurance Law and Health Insurance Law. Yet penalties are almost never applied. Instead, authorities rely on “guidance” — bureaucratic nudges that clearly aren’t working. 

These aren’t accidents. Companies design schedules, split shifts, misclassify staff, or restructure contracts to avoid paying their 9.15% share. If a worker did this to the government, they’d be in jail. 

The Union Response 

With government enforcement this weak, unions have to step in. Our Shakai Hoken Hotline exists for exactly this reason — workers call when employers claim they’re “not eligible” or suddenly cut hours to avoid thresholds. 

When we confirm eligibility, we confront the employer directly. We’ve forced countless companies to enroll workers they were illegally excluding, using negotiation, public pressure, and legal action when needed. 

This isn’t new. In 2005, our industry-wide campaign against illegal exclusion in the language school sector forced major companies to enroll hundreds of workers. But the problem is not limited to dispatch or eikaiwa. The union has also uncovered serious non-enrollment in the university sector. We have dealt with one case — and are now handling two more — where part-timers working over 20 hours a week (and meeting all other requirements) were never enrolled in Kosei Nenkin. In each case, the oversight or negligence has cost workers up to a decade of lost pension premiums. 

We’ve met with government officials, presented evidence of systematic abuse, and demanded real enforcement. When that fails, we escalate. 

And we’ve documented what official statistics miss: workers who don’t know they qualify, those afraid to report violations, and cases hidden by creative misclassification. Every hotline call is another case the surveys ignore — and another employer we can force into compliance. 

Don’t Become a Statistic 

If you meet the requirements for Kosei Nenkin, you have the right to be enrolled — and to make your employer pay their share. For most incorporated businesses, that means working at least three-quarters of full-time hours (about 30 hours a week). At companies with 51+ employees, the threshold drops to 20 hours a week and ¥88,000 monthly pay. 

Don’t wait until retirement to find decades of missing contributions. Check your status. Contact the union. Act now. 

The real number of excluded workers is almost certainly higher than 970,000. Don’t be number 970 thousand and one.