Japan's civil service recruitment market, once regarded as a stable career path with high competition rates, is cooling rapidly. As the pay gap with the private sector widens, some technical positions have failed to attract even a single applicant.
According to the Nihon Keizai Shimbun on Thursday, the city of Sagamihara in Kanagawa Prefecture failed to secure a single applicant in last year's recruitment of college-graduate facility engineers. The city of Niigata also held an open recruitment for electrical and mechanical positions in its water supply division, but with no applicants, it conducted additional recruitment and still failed to fill the positions.
Populous designated cities such as Kobe, Chiba, and Saitama face similar situations. Designated cities are wide-area administrative cities selected by the government from among cities with populations of more than 500,000, including 20 cities nationwide such as Yokohama, Osaka, and Kobe. As even large cities with heavy administrative demand struggle to secure personnel, concerns are growing over the sustainability of local administration.
The wage gap between the private and public sectors is cited as a background factor. According to Japan's Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare, the average wage increase rate at private companies was 5.52% last year, the highest level in about 30 years. In contrast, the pay increase rate for local civil servants stopped at 2.93%, only about half the increase. Analysts say that while private-sector compensation rose sharply during the economic recovery, the relative appeal of public service has declined.
Korea's Competition Rate Falls for Third Straight Year: "Not Someone Else's Problem"
The situation in Korea is not much different from Japan's. With a rise in malicious civil complaints, lower pay compared to the private sector, and high workloads all overlapping, observers say the preference for civil service jobs is no longer what it used to be.
This year's open recruitment for Grade 9 local civil servants drew 141,546 applicants for 23,390 positions, recording an average competition rate of 6.1 to 1. That is the lowest level in the past five years, continuing a three-year downward trend after 10.7 to 1 in 2023, 10.4 to 1 in 2024, and 8.8 to 1 in 2025.
In particular, the average competition rate for science and technology job categories such as civil engineering, construction, and electrical work was 5 to 1, lower than the 6.7 to 1 for administrative categories. With regional population decline and aging infrastructure progressing simultaneously, securing technical civil servants has emerged as a key task for local governments, but applicants are steadily decreasing.
There have also been continued criticisms that the take-home pay of entry-level Grade 9 civil servants is not much different from the minimum wage level. Analysts say that as compensation competitiveness falls behind not only large corporations but also some mid-sized firms, the trend of young people choosing private companies over public service has become clear.
Demand for "3 Million Won Starting Salary": Calls Grow for Better Treatment
Amid this atmosphere, the civil servants' union is demanding a 7.1% pay increase for next year. That is 0.5 percentage points higher than last year's proposal of 6.6%, and more than double the 3.5% civil servant pay increase rate confirmed for this year.
The union argues in particular that the monthly pay of entry-level Grade 9 civil servants must be raised to around 3 million won to restore the competitiveness of public service. The government plans to decide next year's pay increase rate by comprehensively considering fiscal conditions and private-sector wage levels.
Experts believe that simply raising wages will be difficult to resolve the phenomenon of avoiding public service. They point out that to attract talented people to public service, along with realistic compensation, an overhaul of the overall work environment is needed, including strengthened responses to malicious complaints, easing of workload burdens, and improvements to the promotion system.
