The share of university students set to graduate in Japan next spring with job offers declined for the first time in four years, the labor and education ministries said Friday.
As of Oct. 1, 72.9% of job-hunting students had received job offers, down 1.9 percentage points from a year earlier, according to a joint survey by the ministries.
In a seller’s market situation, many students received multiple tentative offers. Such students appear to be taking time to consider which companies to join, resulting in the drop.
The share of male students with job offers decreased to 71.5% from 73.9%, and that of female students to 74.5% from 75.8%.
Still, a labor ministry official said that the final figures „will not be low“ because the favorable situation is expected to continue.
The survey also found that the job offer rate fell to 72.8% from 75.0% for students majoring in humanities and social sciences and to 73.1% from 73.7% for those with science and technology majors.
By region, the rate slid 5.3 percentage points to 71.9% in Chubu, 4.1 points to 68.9% in Kinki, 4.1 points to 65.8% in Chugoku-Shikoku and 1.9 points to 64.9% in Kyushu.
Meanwhile, the rate inched up 0.4 percentage point to 61.1% in Hokkaido-Tohoku and 0.8 point to 83.6% in Kanto, including Tokyo.