At a cabinet meeting held on February 4, a member of Japan’s legislative embassy discussed the issue. In their early twenties, artists can earn as little as 1.1 million yen (USD$9,500) per year, according to Hiroyuki Moriyama. He inquired, “Can you live on that?”
Moriyama, a member of Japan’s center-left Constitutional Democratic Party, began by noting that he’d heard animator wages in China are “an order of magnitude greater” than in Japan. To make ends meet, artists who do want to focus on Japanese productions must work on abroad performances on the side, he stressed.
Pay Scale Appears To Have Increased
The cabinet speaker responded by referencing 2019 data from the anime labor organization Janica, which claims that average salaries have increased since 2015. He asserted that industry pay appears to be higher than the national average, although admitted that people in their 20s and early 30s are underpaid. He also emphasized the animation training programs that the Department of Cultural Affairs is putting in place.
Director & Janica board member Yasuhiro Irie highlighted in a tweet how directors, producers, and others are included in the speaker’s “average salaries.” Young in-betweeners and essential animators earn in the million-yen level, he noted.
Issue Of Salary & Workplace
Irie went on to say that comparing pay to those in other businesses isn’t always misleading because typical salaries in such industries are estimated based on the complete range of positions as well.
According to Janica’s 2019 research, anime workers earn an average of 4.41 million yen (USD$38,000) per year. However, for individuals aged 20–24, this plummeted to 1.55 million yen, which is even below the national standard for that age group.
The issue of salary & workplace circumstances in the business, particularly for younger employees, has risen to prominence in recent times as anime has grown in popularity around the world and artists have become more vocal about their plight. Hunting of the Japanese animators by higher-paying Chinese firms has previously been reported in Japanese media, reports Flipboard.com
