> From: Ibata-Arens, Kathryn

> making it easier for women to work (Japan's childcare
infrastructure
> is possibly the worst in the industrial
> world)

I have no expertise in Japan's contemporary childcare policy other than almost 20 years residence and two children. I completely agree with Japan's urgent need to employ, promote and make full use of women's abilities in the workplace. But I have a doubt about the statement above. I wonder how Japan could be worse than the U.S., which as far as I can tell has no child care infrastructure. (My sister in the States took care of kids in her home with no special qualifications and that was called a day care facility!) In my city in western Tokyo within a ten minute bike ride there are one public and two private day care facilities that accept infants and up and two more that take care of children from the age of three. The facilities that take children from age three have buses that deliver and return them. I don't know the details, but I've also seen ads for day care run by some of the train lines at train stations. The residential areas and parks are nearly devoid of children from 8 a.m. to at least
3 or 4 p.m because even the youngest are in some kind of facility.
That's why we enrolled our daughter in a part time day care program initially, simply because there were no playmates outside of one.
There are public after school facilities for primary school children to play and do homework before a parent comes home. There seems to be one after school facilities (and they are actually separate buildings, not held in schools) for every one or two primary schools, but I haven't verified that. Competition among the private facilities is rather fierce. When we took our daughter out of a nursery school at age three to enroll her in a pre pre kindergarten, the nursery school called attempting to change our minds. Obviously the services available are not sufficient to meet a normal Tokyo commute and normal work day. The government and businesses need to provide day care that meets those needs and to change the definition of a normal work day so that people can and will work more efficiently.
Greg Johnson