Some say "change jobs and your salary goes up." Others say "I changed jobs and my salary went down." Which is it really?
Government statistics give fairly clear numbers. (The data here is from Japan.)
40% earned more, 30% earned less
According to the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare's "2024 Survey on Employment Trends," among people in Japan who changed jobs during 2024, 40.5% saw their wages increase compared with their previous job, up 3.3 points from the year before. Meanwhile, 29.4% saw them decrease, down 3.0 points. The rest were "no change" and so on.
The gap between those who earned more and those who earned less was 11.1 points, wider than the year before. With labor shortages continuing, it's becoming easier to raise your pay by changing jobs.
But flip it around, and 30% of people who changed jobs saw their wages go down. Changing jobs doesn't automatically raise your pay.
Pay isn't decided by individual ability alone
Something easy to overlook when thinking about pay is that much of it is decided by which industry, which company, and which type of job you're in.
Even with the same ability, you'll earn more in a high-margin industry or a company with high pay levels. And however hard you work, it's hard to go beyond the top of your company's pay scale.
So job changes that raise pay go in two broad directions:
- Do the same work somewhere that pays more: your current experience is valued as is, so pay tends to go up
- Move into work where demand is growing: pay may dip at first, but there's more room to rise over several years
Pay tends to go down when you move into a field where your experience doesn't carry over, or when you prioritize conditions other than pay (working style, location, the work itself). That isn't failure; it's the result of what you chose to prioritize.
What to check for a job change that raises pay
| What to check | Why |
|---|---|
| How your current pay breaks down (base salary, bonuses, overtime, allowances) | If a lot of your pay is overtime, moving to a company with less overtime can lower your annual income |
| What's included in the offered salary | Line up the units you're comparing, such as fixed overtime pay and expected bonuses |
| How raises work after you join | Growth over three or five years can matter more than the first year's pay |
| The market rate for the same type of job | Know the market from job listings and job services before you negotiate |
The first is especially easy to miss. Among people who feel "my pay went down," it's not unusual that it went down only by the amount of overtime they no longer do. Converted to an hourly rate, it may even have gone up.
It's fine to negotiate salary
After receiving an offer, it's not unusual to say what you'd hoped for in response to the salary offered. It helps to back it up with your current pay, other companies' offers, and the market rate for the same job.
If negotiating yourself is hard, a recruitment agent may negotiate for you. Agents are paid based on the new hire's salary, so they're often keen to negotiate.
Today's exercise
- Look at last year's tax withholding statement and write down how your pay broke down
- Calculate your annual pay without overtime, and your hourly rate
- Decide whether what you most want to raise by changing jobs is your pay, or something else
More people are raising their pay by changing jobs. But not everyone.
Pay depends far more on where you work than on how hard you work.
References
Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare (Japan). "Summary of the 2024 Survey on Employment Trends" (in Japanese).
Rōdō Shimbunsha. "2024 Survey on Employment Trends" (in Japanese). https://www.rodo.co.jp/series/205462/