In September 2016 Japan’s Prime Minister Shinzo Abe held the first meeting of the Council for the Realization of Work Style Reform to address, among other labor issues, Japan’s reliance on long working hours.

Global gender inequality has increased in the past 12 months and is now at its largest point since the financial crisis in 2008, according to the World Economic Forum (WEF).

 

 

 

Investing in girls will result in significant socio-cultural, political, and economic dividends for countries and society, says the United Nations Population Fund’s (UNPFA) latest State of World Population (WOP) report—10: How our future depends on a girl at this decisive age.
 

Across Europe workforces are getting older in parallel to the aging of the general population. This could cause productivity to decline in the years ahead and provides challenges for policymakers already dealing with high unemployment and debt.

 

Girls aged between 10 and 14 worldwide spend 50% more time on household chores than boys of the same age, according to a new report from Unicef.

Antonio Guterres will take over the role of UN secretary-general from Ban Ki-moon when his second five-year term comes to an end on January 1, 2017, having led the UN’s refugee agency (UNHCR) from 2005 to 2015.
 

A summary of IZA World of Labor articles in the press in September.