What is “Yarigai Sakushu (やりがい搾取)” ?
In Japan, “Yarigai Sakushu” is an image similar to the following picture. The person sitting in the chair is a manager and the person carrying the chair is a worker. Bait hanging from the fishing line is “Yarigai”.
The picture below is an image of “dangle a carrot in front of a horse”. The picture above is a replacement of a carrot in the below picture with a word of “Yarigai”.
Japanese spelling
Yarigai Sakushu is written in kanji as “やりがい搾取” and in hiragana as “やりがいさくしゅ”.
- “Yarigai (やりがい)” means like challenging but rewarding, worthwhile, passion
- “Sakushu (搾取)” means like exploitation
Word description
“Yarigai Sakushu” refers to the act of management making workers highly aware of “Yarigai” in order to glorify service overtime (long working hours) and avoid paying wages (premium wages) that should be paid. The term is used to describe this.
Around 2007, the term “Yarigai Sakushu” began to be widely recognized and used in books and other publications. It is said that black companies – in Japan, a “black company” is a company that habitually flouts labor regulations – and “Yarigai Sakushu” are closely related, and that “challenging but rewarding, worthwhile” and “reward, pay” do not have a trade-off relationship.
Strangely enough, many workers in Japan seem to accept “Yarigai Sakushu” or are unaware of it.
How to be called in other countries
Other words with similar meanings in other countries and languages seem to be referred to as:
- English: Passion exploitation (Ref. BBC Worklife)
- Korean: 열정 페이 (Ref. Wikipedia)
References
The following web pages were consulted in writing this article:
Source of pictures: Irasutoya (いらすとや) – Cute and adorable images (like caricatures) are the works of Irastoya, a web site offering free images. You can also use them for free, but free use is subject to conditions.
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