In recent years, there have been an increasing number of cases that people are trying to improve both goods and services through the quality of sleep. In the examples was a comparison between the top 20% of companies whose employees sleep the most and the bottom 20%. Companies that sleep longer have a 3.7 percentage point higher ordinary profit margin. By making the employee's body easier, they increased productivity. In Japan, there is a long-standing awareness of the successful experience of high economic growth, where people are willing to work long hours. Even mid-career and higher-level business people have not let go of their awareness of long working hours. This means that the work system of cutting sleep, working hard, and producing results continues. On the other hand, most of the world's studies report that short sleep time interferes with concentration and lowers productivity.
The average sleep time of Japanese in 2020 is 6 hours and 22 minutes, which is the lowest among 14 countries. Furthermore, Japan's labor productivity per worker is $78,655, which is the 28th lowest among 38 countries. Labor productivity per employee is the lowest among the seven major countries (G7). This factor seems to be low productivity due to lack of sleep. It can be said that the negative effects of sleep debt in Japan go beyond the individual level. Unlike Europe and the United States, the movement to take sleep measures as a corporate strategy is weak. Inevitably, the movement to regard sleep as an individual problem is becoming more and more deeply rooted. The EU requires companies to have an 11-hour work interval from the time they leave the office to the time they come to work the next day. The United States has introduced a system in which it is advantageous for management to finish work within normal business hours. The United States sets premiums for overtime work at 1.5 times normal wages. If they increase overtime, they are making a system that will make a loss to the company.
In the case of Japan, it seems that the trend continues that even if an employee is forced to work overtime, it is enough to just get through the situation. In order to change the sleep deprivation in Japan, it seems that forcibly creating a mechanism to change the behavior of companies is also an option. The negative effects of sleep deprivation can also be seen at work. There are also reports that sleep-deprived bosses are less able to control themselves, which can lead to power harassment. Sleep-deprived bosses are more likely to use offensive language. It is increasingly pointed out that the low "quality" of sleep is a hotbed of power harassment and mistakes. Lack of sleep is proving to be a hotbed for various problems in the workplace.