In a 7-Eleven in Ōita Prefecture, one man bore the burden of keeping the store running 24 hours a day. After six months of toil without a break, he took his own life. The case, which was eventually certified as death by overwork, highlights how karōshi (過労死) remains a stubborn issue in Japan. It also shows how Japan’s combini are struggling to maintain round-the-clock operations in the face of a dwindling population.
Leaving behind a wife and child
According to Asahi Shimbun, the 38-year-old man worked as a 7-Eleven manager for an Ōita-based franchise of Japan’s most popular combini since 2019. In 2021, he got married and soon afterwards had a child.
His wife says that, in the one year and four months they were married, he hardly had a day off. As store manager, he was responsible for every aspect of the store’s operation, including cleaning and stocking. If he couldn’t fill a shift, he had to staff it himself.
The man eventually died by suicide. In the six months leading up to the event, he didn’t take a single day off.
His family applied to have his death ruled an official case of overwork. The franchise owner objected, saying the man had “other issues” outside of work. Japan’s Labour Standards Inspection Office, however, didn’t buy it. They certified the case as death by overwork on November 16th, 2024. That means the company is liable for the man’s pension and funeral expenses.
Neither the franchise company nor Seven & I Holdings, the parent company of 7-Eleven Japan, deigned to respond to Asahi’s requests for comment. Seven & I said they couldn’t comment on how a franchisee operates their business.
Not the first case of combini overwork
Japan’s government has worked to address cases of karōshi since the problem first came to light in the late 1980s. Japan now has a so-called “karōshi line” which prevents companies from compelling workers to work more than 100 hours of overtime in a month.
Japanese companies, however, have fought every step of the way to skirt these rules in any way they can. In 2016, Takahashi Matsuri took her own life after working punishing hours for advertising company Dentsu Corporation. It later came out that Dentsu ordered employees and managers to fake reported working hours to avoid reporting that it was compelling employees to cross the karōshi line.
Other companies, like 7 & I in this case, rely on subcontractors and franchisees to do their karōshi for them. Amazon, for example, relies on so-called delivery service providers to work their delivery drivers in grueling 12-hour shifts.
This isn’t the first time overwork has come up in the context of combinis, either. In 2019, Seven & I threatened to terminate one individual franchisee’s contract when he said he could no longer run his store 24 hours a day. The 57-year-old owner said he couldn’t hire enough people to keep the store running by himself.
The combini staffing situation remains chronic. Most convenience store chains now rely heavily on foreign exchange students to fill in shifts they can’t fill with Japanese employees due to the country’s rapidly declining population.
Companies frequently destroy evidence of overwork
Asahi’s article drew almost 4,000 comments on Yahoo! News JP, where many users called for stricter regulations of convenience store chains. Many are calling for an end to 24-hour operations, particularly in areas of Japan (smaller cities and towns) where they’re not necessary.
One expert, Konno Haruki, also called out the need for stricter regulations around how overwork cases are investigated. Konno, a researcher in labor strategies, wrote that investigations into overwork have to be instigated by families.
“Even then,” he says, “companies aren’t truly obligated to cooperate in the investigation. It’s common for companies to destroy evidence while the funeral’s happening. There are cases of company employees hounding surviving family at the morgue or funeral to confiscate the employee’s equipment, such as cell phones and laptops.”
Konno says he’s even seen cases of companies making up fake workplace relationships and blaming the suicide on a break-up. Some employees have even falsely testified to such relationships in court.
As a result, says Konno, despite some 2,000 cases of suicide in Japan a year being connected by police to work problems, only 100 are certified as work-related deaths.
Hopefully, the victim’s family gets some small comfort that justice was done in his case. How many other cases of overwork in Japan, however, are still being swept under the rug?
If you are in Japan and need help, you can call the following numbers:
0570-064-556 for kokoro-no-kenkou-soudan (こころの健康相談) operated by prefectural and city organizations.
0570-783-556 for inochi-no-denwa (いのちの電話) operated by Federation of Inochi No Denwa.
0120-061-338 for #inochi-SOS (＃いのちSOS) operated by jisatsu-taisaku-shien-sentā (自殺対策支援センター), or suicide prevention support center.
0120-0-78310 for Children’s SOS Support Desk operated by the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science, and Technology.
If you are in the US, call 911 for emergencies and 988 for the suicide hotline.
To find another country’s suicide hotline, see the International Suicide Hotline page.
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