Japanese Workers Don’t Just Quit. You Shouldn’t Have That Problem

For many citizens of Japan, 12-hour work days are the norm. In addition, there may be hours of drunken socializing with your boss and co-workers. Instead of working 9:00 to 5:00, you may have a 9:00 to 9:00 schedule, plus additional hours as needed.

Increasingly, Japanese workers are pushing back against this traditional, life-sucking schedule. But they’re not at the point of openly rebelling against the system. Some Japanese rely on paid intermediaries to notify their bosses they’re leaving because they don’t want to do it themselves. In a society where respect is paramount, a boss may see quitting as disrespectful. Quitting may also make it more difficult for a worker to get the next job.

You Can (Probably) Quit Your US Job

Unless a contract binds you, you can quit your job with or without notice. Unless their motivation breaks a contract or law, your employer can also fire you, with or without reason or notice. In this country, a decades- or life-long job is a relic of the past. Many American workers have embraced “job hopping.” Long-term, hopping jobs may be the better strategy for earning more money during one’s lifetime.

Work in Japan Can Be Fatally Stressful

In Japan, asking to leave work early or taking time off can be dicey for employees, according to CNN. Tendering a resignation can be seen as a slap in the face to a supervisor. They may tear up resignation letters and harass workers to try to force them to stay (including coming to their homes).

Some Japanese employers take this to the extreme. Japan is famous for its overwork culture, where employees work punishing hours under high pressure from supervisors. The worst employers are known as sweatshops. It’s gotten to the point where the Japanese government publishes a list of unethical employers to warn job seekers of what they may be getting into.

Working conditions may be so stressful that workers feel no psychological safety and may feel threatened. Working for some Japanese companies may lead to “karoshi” or “death by overwork.”

The nation’s Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare states that 54 employees died of work-induced brain and heart conditions and received compensation in 2022 (down from 160 twenty years ago). Claims for compensation for work-related stress are up to 2,683 from 341 in the same time frame.

Upset employers are not unknown in the US, and your boss may claim not to accept your resignation. But unless you change your mind, it’s like your employer won’t accept the sun will rise tomorrow. Slavery is illegal in the US (except for prisoners), so (barring contractual obligations or prison) you can’t be forced to work. Or if you do break a contract, you have to pay for the breach.

Japanese Company Facilitates Employees’ Resignations

CNN found Momuri, an agency that helps employees quit working for intimidating bosses. This type of service started before the COVID-19 pandemic, but demand grew afterward. Even some of the most die-hard “salarymen” reflected on their careers at the time and wanted change. After the pandemic ended, demand for agencies that eased workers’ departures surged.

Momuri (“I can’t do this anymore” in Japanese) started in 2022. Shiori Kawamata, their operations manager, told CNN they got about 11,000 inquiries from potential clients in the past year. They charge about $150 to someone working full-time to help them submit resignations, negotiate with their employers, and recommend attorneys if legal disputes come up.

More Older Workers + Fewer Younger Workers = More Leverage for Employees

Young people’s approach to work in Japan and the US is changing, and demographics are turning against employers in both countries. The workforce is aging and birthrates are declining, so fewer people will be available to replace them.

The US workforce aged 55 and older numbered about 21 million in 2003 and 38 million by 2023, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Due to retirements and disability, Japan’s workforce is expected to drop from 65.3 million people in 2017 to 52.4 million by 2040, reports the World Economic Forum.

Barring an economic downturn and reduced demand for workers, employees will be increasingly picky about what work they’re willing to do and at what pay rate because the supply of workers will shrink. Employers who stress out their employees will have a harder time because people will not want to work for them.

Japanese Workers Are Increasingly Quitting Their Jobs But Not Making a Spectacle of It

Japanese workers are increasingly willing to quit if their expectations don’t meet their job’s reality, but they haven’t reached the point of some Americans who enjoy their “blaze of glory” announcing to co-workers and supervisors they’re leaving. Japanese workers are less confrontational and increasingly prefer outside help when they quit, in part not to “burn bridges” that may help them get another job.

Kawamanta told CNN, “We think it’s best if people can tell their bosses themselves, but hearing the horror stories of our clients, I don’t think that our business will disappear anytime soon.”

Contact Kingston Law Group

Kingston Law Group handles a wide range of employment matters. If you have questions about leaving your job and possible legal consequences, please contact our Central Jersey law office at 609-683-7400 toll-free to arrange a consultation. We accept credit cards and offer general appointments from 9 a.m. to 5:30 p.m., Monday to Friday, or pre-arranged evening appointment times.

If You See an Ad for a New Jersey Lawyer, Thank (or Blame) Hanan Isaacs

In 1984, Ronald Reagan was re-elected President. The Summer Olympics were held in Los Angeles. Apple introduced the Macintosh personal computer. It was also the year Hanan M. Isaacs and Robert A. Felmeister filed a lawsuit in federal court to liberalize New Jersey’s ethics rules governing lawyer advertising.

Forty years ago, the Supreme Court of New Jersey’s rules governing lawyer advertising were highly restrictive. The Court limited lawyer

 advertising to “tombstone” ads, which listed legal services and a price. The Court disallowed TV/cable ads and any Madison Avenue techniques (music, lyrics, animation, dramatization). These methods were expressly prohibited, upon pain of discipline, up to and including disbarment.

In 1982, two young lawyers, Mr. Isaacs and Mr. Felmeister, challenged the New Jersey ethics rules, sometimes defending and at other times prosecuting them to change the rules. Their challenge, ultimately successful, took five years and a lot of hard work by the young law partners and their retained legal counsel, David B. Rubin, Esq. As a result, in 1986, the Supreme Court substantially relaxed its rules, allowing a wide array of modern advertising tools. The theory behind the US Supreme Court’s adoption of first amendment rights in commercial advertising, on which Felmeister and Isaacs relied, depended upon the public’s need for information, especially in practice areas that are less known and important for people’s lives. We have all seen (too many?) ads for attorney personal injury law, but every practice area today is well marketed by legal practitioners for the benefit of the public.

For many years, Mr. Isaacs’s law firm, now known as Kingston Law Group, has focused on internet marketing to publicize its work in family law, employment law, and general civil and criminal litigation, including alternative dispute resolution in those fields.

Professional Conduct Rule Restricting Advertising Challenged

Felmeister and Isaacs disputed the constitutionality of the State Supreme Court’s advertising regulation, which prohibited “the use of drawings, animations, dramatization, music or lyrics.” It required that “[a]ll advertisements … be presented in a dignified manner.” according to the Court’s decision.

The new rules stated that lawyers could advertise their services through:

• Public media
• Telephone directories (remember them?)
• Legal directories
• Newspapers
• Periodicals
• Radio
• Television
• Mailed written communication

No advertising could be false or misleading or use drawings, animations, dramatization, music, or lyrics. Felmeister and Isaacs fully embraced that requirement.

They filed their case in US District Court, which the State Supreme Court moved to remand to the State Courts for a trial. The trial court took testimony from the law partners, expert witnesses on both sides, and came up with a report and recommendations, which the Supreme Court largely accepted:

• The rule against “drawings, animations, dramatizations, music or lyrics” in attorney advertising was unconstitutional, given the US Supreme Court’s prior attorney advertising decisions
• These techniques, which might be factually deceptive, aren’t inherently so
• The evidence supporting the use of these techniques shows they are “only inherently misleading in the sense … [of] inducing action more on the basis of emotion than rational thought.”
• Despite this emotional element, their prohibition would “preclude the effective use of legal services advertising and constitute more extensive regulation than necessary to serve the governmental interests in precluding false, misleading, and undignified advertising.”
• Preventing these techniques would lead to “tombstone” ads that would fail to “accomplish the intended purposes of attention-getting, recall assistance (memory storage), and supplying substantive legal services information to the public.”
• Ads must continue to be truthful, not misleading, and presented in a dignified manner

State Supreme Court Agrees With Hanan and Robert

The high court agreed with most of the lower court’s suggestions and concluded that “the public interest would be better served” by changing the then applicable rule to one that:

• Required all legal services advertising be predominantly informational
• Limited the prohibition of “drawings, animations, dramatization, music or lyrics” to television advertising
• Ended the requirement that ads be presented “in a dignified manner”
• Prohibited using “the shock or amusement value of absurd portrayals wholly irrelevant to the selection of counsel”
• Continued to prohibit false or misleading advertising

The Supreme Court stated their decision was based on policy and federal constitutional grounds:

We believe that attorney advertising without any restrictions…might seriously damage important public interests, but that excessive restriction might harm other public interests equally important.

The goal, as we view it, is to strike the proper balance, one that results in the largest net gain for the public…The public would be well served by more information about the legal system in order to know its legal rights and to help it choose a lawyer to enforce those rights…a substantial portion of the public is ill-informed about its rights, fearful about going to an attorney, and ignorant concerning how to choose one.

Attorney advertising is perhaps the best way to meet these needs…the public would be better served if it could obtain legal services at a lower price…attorney advertising is one of the best ways to foster price competition…our review of advertising on the record before us demonstrates that advertisements can be devised that provide substantial information, that have the added virtue of being interesting, and that seem to pose minimal risks to the interests mentioned…

This decision changed the language of the advertising rule (RPC 7.2(a)), and it remains in place 40 years later.

From Tombstone to Billboard

Kingston Law Group and its predecessors relied mostly on internet advertising and marketing. It ran occasional “paper” ads in local media. However, in 2024, due entirely to chance and brilliant in-house marketing by Chief Paralegal, Shelby Buch, the firm ran electronic billboard ads on Route 130 in South Brunswick for two weeks, courtesy of a winning raffle. It took forty years to get from tombstone ads to electronic billboard marketing. The three ads rotated, exposing the firm’s name, number, and ironic content for eight seconds for so many minutes, twenty-four hours a day.

The humorous ad content, intended to grab attention, included titles like “Nothing Says Holidays Like Divorce” and “Looking to Sue Your Boss This Holiday Season?”

Do You Need Help With an Employment or Family Law Matter?

If you have questions or need legal representation, contact us and arrange a near-term initial consultation at a reduced hourly rate. We are “Compassionate Counsel, Tough Advocates” ready to help you and your family! Call us at 609-683-7400 or contact us online today. You will be glad you did.