HOME

TheInfoList



Click Here for Items Related To - Black company (Japanese term)
OR:
Black company (Japanese term) on:   [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Amazon]

A , also referred to in English as a black corporation or black business, is a
Japanese Japanese may refer to: * Something from or related to Japan, an island country in East Asia * Japanese language, spoken mainly in Japan * Japanese people, the ethnic group that identifies with Japan through ancestry or culture ** Japanese diaspor ...
term for an exploitative,
sweatshop A sweatshop or sweat factory is a cramped workplace with very poor and/or illegal working conditions, including little to no breaks, inadequate work space, insufficient lighting and ventilation, or uncomfortably or dangerously high or low temperat ...
-type employment system. The term "sweatshop" is associated with
manufacturing Manufacturing is the creation or production of goods with the help of equipment, labor, machines, tools, and chemical or biological processing or formulation. It is the essence of the secondary sector of the economy. The term may refer ...
, and the garment trade in particular; however, in
Japan Japan is an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean off the northeast coast of the Asia, Asian mainland, it is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan and extends from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea ...
black companies are most often associated with office work, rather than the
clothing industry Clothing industry or garment industry summarizes the types of trade and industry along the production and value chain of clothing and garments, starting with the textile industry (producers of cotton, wool, fur, and synthetic fibre), embelli ...
.


Etymology

The term "black company" was coined in the early 2000s by young IT workers but has since come to be applied to various industries.


Conditions

While specifics may vary from workplace to workplace and company to company, a typical practice at a black company is to hire a large number of young employees and then force them to work large amounts of
overtime Overtime is the amount of time someone works beyond normal working hours. The term is also used for the pay received for this time. Normal hours may be determined in several ways: *by custom (what is considered healthy or reasonable by society) ...
without overtime pay. Conditions are poor, and workers are subjected to verbal abuse and "
power harassment Power harassment is a form of harassment and workplace bullying in which someone in a position of greater power uses that power unjustifiably against a lower-ranking person, typically just for a display of dominance. It includes a range of behavio ...
" (bullying) by their superiors. In order to make the employees stay, superiors of black companies would often threaten young employees with disrepute if they chose to quit.


Noteworthy cases

Mina Mori, a 26-year-old employee of the restaurant chain Watami, committed suicide two months after joining the company in 2008. Her family lodged a complaint with the
Yokosuka is a city in Kanagawa Prefecture, Japan. , the city has a population of 373,797, and a population density of . The total area is . Yokosuka is the 11th-most populous city in the Greater Tokyo Area, and the 12th in the Kantō region. The city i ...
Labor Standards Office to seek recognition of the suicide as work-related. When their claim was denied, they appealed it to the
Kanagawa is a Prefectures of Japan, prefecture of Japan located in the Kantō region of Honshu. Kanagawa Prefecture is the List of Japanese prefectures by population, second-most populous prefecture of Japan at 9,221,129 (1 April 2022) and third-dens ...
Prefectural Labor Bureau, which recognized work-related stress as the cause of the decline of her mental health. In December 2015, Watami reached an out-of-court settlement of million (equivalent to million in ) with the family, and Watami founder
Miki Watanabe is a Japanese entrepreneur and politician. He founded the Watami chain of izakaya restaurants and headed the company until 2011, when he resigned to run in the 2011 Tokyo gubernatorial election. Watanabe's run for the governorship of Tokyo was ...
apologized.


See also

*
Crunch (video games) In the video game industry, crunch (or crunch culture) is compulsory overtime during the development of a game. Crunch is common in the industry and can lead to work weeks of 65–80 hours for extended periods of time, often uncompensated be ...
*
Japanese work environment Many both in and outside Japan share an image of the Japanese work environment that is based on a and model used by large companies as well as a reputation of long work-hours and strong devotion to one's company. This environment is said to refl ...
*
McJob "McJob" is a slang term for a low-paying, low-prestige dead-end job that requires few skills and offers very little chance of advancement. The term "McJob" comes from the name of the fast-food restaurant McDonald's, but is used to describe any l ...
*
Occupational stress Occupational stress is psychological stress related to one's job. Occupational stress refers to a chronic condition. Occupational stress can be managed by understanding what the stressful conditions at work are and taking steps to remediate tho ...
*
Workplace bullying Workplace bullying is a persistent pattern of mistreatment from others in the workplace that causes physical and/or emotional harm. It includes verbal, nonverbal Nonverbal communication is the transmission of messages or signals through a non ...


References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Black Company 2000s neologisms Japanese business terms Manufacturing in Japan Ethically disputed working conditions Employment in Japan Labor in Japan