Tomoko Yoshino said that gender inequality is also interwoven into Japan’s tax and pension system, and is part of a wider problem on workers’ rights.
Officials are concerned that small and medium-sized firms in the country will grow to be overly depend on the subsidies.
On October 1, the government lifted the country’s state of emergency amid a sharp drop in new COVID-19 cases, prompting businesses to hire staff.
Prime Minister Fumio Kishida had vowed earlier to draw up an economic package worth "tens of trillions of yen" to revive the economy.
Although wages levels have been increasing, workers are still making less than they used to as compared to before the pandemic hit.
Besides prioritising wage raises, the prime minister also said that he plans on a capital gains taxes discussion sometime in the future.
Over the next 12 months, 28% of companies expect to increase the number of employees as businesses recover from the pandemic.
The Japan Federation of Employers' Associations says taking on secondary employment can result in a more productive workforce.
Haruhiko Kuroda emphasised the need to create a virtuous cycle in which higher wages give households more purchasing power.
The country’s job availability fell for the first time in four months in August as the government expanded the state of emergency over more regions.
The roles offered typically involve short hours, and include tasks like weeding and cleaning that bring in an average monthly pay of less than ¥40,000.
The implementation rate of remote work in large companies shows a trend of being about twice that of SMEs during the pandemic.
About 9.8% of companies intends to hire more regular staff, while 3.0% will cut down on such hires when the country’s minimum wage is raised.
Regulators met with Chinese tech giants to discuss efforts to protect the basic rights of gig workers, following new government guidelines.
Japan's health ministry has found that clusters at workplaces were due to insufficient anti-COVID measures.
The rise reflected an increase in non-regular pay, which declined last year due to a fall in overtime working hours amid the pandemic.
A survey by the Japan Business Federation took into account the agreed bonuses of 159 Tokyo-listed firms with over 500 employees.
Some 97.2% of the male national public servants whose children were born between July 2020 and March 2021 took paternity leave for at least a month.
The Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare found that 37% of 24,042 businesses investigated have violated overtime laws.
A survey revealed that many companies found a lack of communication among employees a barrier to remote work, among other challenges.
The programme was first introduced in fiscal 2020 as a two-year measure, and is set to expire in March 2022.
Last week, Japan extended its state of emergency in Tokyo and other regions, and announced new measures that covered seven more prefectures.
From next January, public employees will be granted up to 10 days of paid leave for fertility treatments. as Japan tries to addressing a falling birth rate.
The government is planning to require more companies to provide written contracts when they hire freelancers.
The survey by the Japan Business Federation found that the pandemic impacted businesses in the non-manufacturing sectors the most.
More workplaces are scheduled to start their on-site vaccination programmes In August, said prime minister Yoshihide Suga.
Lawmakers have since escalated calls for a new relief package, with the idea of an extra budget valued at 30 trillion yen being floated around.
The recovery was attributed to hiring at pandemic-hit restaurants and retailers as the state of emergency was lifted in some areas.
The proportion of people working completely remotely in a recent week in July stood at 11.6%, down from 18.5% in April.
The labour ministry has recommended raising the national average minimum wage by 3.1% to 930 yen (US$8.43) per hour.
