Sayonara To Full Employment

In this long winter of Japan's economic discontent, hundreds were expected at a weekend job fair for college students but thousands came. Japan has gone from jobs for life to few jobs at all, reports CBS News Correspondent Barry Petersen.

The unemployment rate is now higher than America's -- uncommon for a country accustomed to nearly full employment.

From semiconductors to sushi, company recruiters interviewed a lot of people at the job fair, but some will hire only two or three out of a hundred interviewees.

Nissan is a good example of what is happening as profits evaporate; they are not firing, but also not hiring. Twelve hundred students got jobs at Nissan last year, but only 150 have been picked up this year.

At ANA Airlines, the score is even worse - no jobs this year.
Twenty-year-old Kanae Hashimoto wants a job as an interpreter in a bleak market that has her friends scared.

"Some people are afraid they won't find any job," she says.

Job prospects are even more dismal for women. A book listing everybody who is interviewing at the job fair is filled with job descriptions that specify men, "because our work is very hard," says one prospective employer.

Some students are praying or writing religious messages for jobs, but even divine intervention can't change the fact that for the young of Japan Inc., the future isn't what it used to be.

Reported by Barry Petersen
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