DHAKA: One in three young Japanese women wants to get married and be a full-time housewife, a government survey has showed, despite growing calls for increased female participation in the workforce.

The poll, which quizzed more than 3,000 people aged 15-39, found 34 percent of unmarried women did not want to work when they settled down.

But the survey, by the Health, Labour and Welfare Ministry, found that men were on the whole less keen on the idea, with only one in five saying they wanted a future wife to stay at home all day.

Despite high levels of education, many women in Japan drop out of the workforce when they have children, and social pressures to play the homemaker remain strong, reports The Straits Times.

BDST: 1354 HRS, SEPT 25, 2013
RoR/RK