# Japan implements the Specified Skilled Worker residence status (2019)

Date: 2019

On 1 April 2019 Japan implemented the Specified Skilled Worker residence status, enabling qualified foreign workers to work in designated sectors facing serious labour shortages. Contemporaneous OECD analysis places the measure within Japan's response to a shrinking and ageing workforce. The record concerns the implemented labour-migration channel, not a claim that it fully offsets demographic ageing.

## Drivers

- Demographic ageing and labour-shortage pressure: https://factrail.ai/drivers/mig-demographic-ageing

## Sources

_Sources are listed on the canonical page._

## Methodology

https://factrail.ai/methodology

Canonical: https://factrail.ai/facts/mig-fact-japan-specified-skilled-worker-2019