# Pensions, insurance and welfare — Japanese laws in English — japanlaw.org

This is the Markdown twin of https://japanlaw.org/en/laws/social-security. Every law, and how to address a provision: https://japanlaw.org/llms.txt. The same laws as MCP tools (no sign-in): https://japanlaw.org/mcp.

Japan's social security law in English: pensions, health, care, employment and accident insurance, child allowance, public assistance and medical care.

- Pensions, insurance and welfare (社会保障): 14 laws on this topic, each Act (法律) with the orders that go with it — Cabinet Orders (政令) and Ministerial Orders (省令) — listed beneath it, then the laws at home in another topic that this one lists too.
- Each law links to its page; its Markdown twin is the same path under /md. The descriptions are this site's own summaries, not the law's words.
- Only the Japanese as published by the government has legal effect.

## Laws

- [国民年金法 / National Pension Act](https://japanlaw.org/en/national-pension-act): 昭和三十四年法律第百四十一号 · Act (法律) · text in force since 2026-10-01 · 267 articles in the main text · English: 100% of paragraphs. Japan's national pension (国民年金): who is insured — people living in Japan from 20 to 59, everyone in the Employees' Pension Insurance, and their dependent spouses aged 20 to 59 — what category 1 insured persons pay, and the basic pensions it pays in old age, on disability and on a death. Markdown: https://japanlaw.org/md/en/national-pension-act
- [厚生年金保険法 / Employees' Pension Insurance Act](https://japanlaw.org/en/employees-pension-insurance-act): 昭和二十九年法律第百十五号 · Act (法律) · text in force since 2026-10-01 · 221 articles in the main text · English: 100% of paragraphs. Japan's employees' pension insurance (厚生年金保険): which workplaces must join, who is insured — employees under 70 at those workplaces, public employees and private school staff included, apart from those Article 12 leaves out, such as day, short-term and seasonal workers and some part-time workers — the contributions employer and employee share on standardized pay and bonuses, and the old-age, disability and survivors' benefits it pays. Markdown: https://japanlaw.org/md/en/employees-pension-insurance-act
- [確定拠出年金法 / Defined Contribution Pension Act](https://japanlaw.org/en/defined-contribution-pension-act): 平成十三年法律第八十八号 · Act (法律) · text in force since 2026-04-01 · 147 articles in the main text · English: 100% of paragraphs. Japan's defined contribution pensions (確定拠出年金): money an employer or the person pays in is invested on the person's own instructions and paid out as benefits in old age, through a corporate-type pension plan (企業型年金) an employer runs or the individual-type pension plan (個人型年金). Markdown: https://japanlaw.org/md/en/defined-contribution-pension-act
- [労働者災害補償保険法 / Industrial Accident Compensation Insurance Act](https://japanlaw.org/en/industrial-accident-insurance-act): 昭和二十二年法律第五十号 · Act (法律) · text in force since 2026-07-17 · 98 articles in the main text · English: 100% of paragraphs. The government-run insurance that pays benefits to workers injured, made ill, disabled or killed through their work or on their way to and from work, and to their families, and helps them return to working life. Markdown: https://japanlaw.org/md/en/industrial-accident-insurance-act
- [雇用保険法 / Employment Insurance Act](https://japanlaw.org/en/employment-insurance-act): 昭和四十九年法律第百十六号 · Act (法律) · text in force since 2026-05-13 · 120 articles in the main text · English: 100% of paragraphs. Japan's public employment insurance (雇用保険): money for workers who lose their job, take training, earn less after 60, take leave to care for family or bring up a child, or work shorter hours for a child, and programs the government can run to keep people in work — grants to employers who keep workers on, help departing workers find new jobs, or hire — and to develop workers' skills, paid for mainly by premiums and the state. Markdown: https://japanlaw.org/md/en/employment-insurance-act
- [労働保険の保険料の徴収等に関する法律 / Act on the Collection, etc. of Insurance Premiums of Labor Insurance](https://japanlaw.org/en/labor-insurance-premium-collection-act): 昭和四十四年法律第八十四号 · Act (法律) · text in force since 2025-10-01 · 54 articles in the main text · English: 100% of paragraphs. How employers pay for industrial accident insurance and employment insurance (together, labor insurance): when the insurance relationship with a business begins and ends, how the premiums are worked out, paid and collected, and the associations that may handle this work for employers with few workers. Markdown: https://japanlaw.org/md/en/labor-insurance-premium-collection-act
- [健康保険法 / Health Insurance Act](https://japanlaw.org/en/health-insurance-act): 大正十一年法律第七十号 · Act (法律) · text in force since 2026-10-01 · 323 articles in the main text · English: 100% of paragraphs. Health insurance for employees and their dependents: it pays for medical treatment and gives cash benefits for illness, injury, childbirth and death not caused by work, funded by premiums that employers and employees generally share half and half, with the national treasury bearing, within its budget each year, the cost of administering the scheme and subsidizing part of the Association's benefits. Markdown: https://japanlaw.org/md/en/health-insurance-act
- [国民健康保険法 / National Health Insurance Act](https://japanlaw.org/en/national-health-insurance-act): 昭和三十三年法律第百九十二号 · Act (法律) · text in force since 2026-10-01 · 190 articles in the main text · English: 100% of paragraphs. Health insurance for people with an address in Japan whom Article 6 does not leave out, chiefly because employee health insurance or another scheme it lists covers them: the prefecture with its municipalities, and National Health Insurance Societies (国民健康保険組合), give insurance benefits for illness, injury, childbirth and death, met from premiums collected from heads of household (世帯主) and society members and from shares the State and the prefecture bear. Markdown: https://japanlaw.org/md/en/national-health-insurance-act
- [介護保険法 / Long-Term Care Insurance Act](https://japanlaw.org/en/long-term-care-insurance-act): 平成九年法律第百二十三号 · Act (法律) · text in force since 2026-10-01 · 405 articles in the main text · English: 100% of paragraphs. Long-term care insurance, run by each municipality: who is insured from the age of 40, how premiums are paid, how a need for care or support is certified, and the care services the insurance pays for. Markdown: https://japanlaw.org/md/en/long-term-care-insurance-act
- [高齢者の医療の確保に関する法律 / Act on Assurance of Medical Care for Elderly People](https://japanlaw.org/en/elderly-medical-care-act): 昭和五十七年法律第八十号 · Act (法律) · text in force since 2026-10-01 · 202 articles in the main text · English: 100% of paragraphs. Health insurance for people 75 and over with an address (住所) in Japan, and for people 65 to 74 there whom their association certifies as disabled, other than members of a household on public assistance and others a Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare Order excludes, run in each prefecture by an association of all its municipalities (後期高齢者医療広域連合) — together with the duty of every medical insurer to give its members aged 40 and over checkups for lifestyle diseases, the plans for keeping medical spending appropriate (医療費適正化計画), and the payments that share the cost of older people's medical care among insurers. Markdown: https://japanlaw.org/md/en/elderly-medical-care-act
- [児童手当法 / Child Allowance Act](https://japanlaw.org/en/child-allowance-act): 昭和四十六年法律第七十三号 · Act (法律) · text in force since 2025-06-01 · 34 articles in the main text · English: 100% of paragraphs. The child allowance (児童手当): a monthly payment to the people raising children, to steady family life and help children grow up healthy. Markdown: https://japanlaw.org/md/en/child-allowance-act
- [生活保護法 / Public Assistance Act](https://japanlaw.org/en/public-assistance-act): 昭和二十五年法律第百四十四号 · Act (法律) · text in force since 2026-10-01 · 126 articles in the main text · English: 100% of paragraphs. Public assistance from the State to all citizens (国民) living in poverty, according to how great their need is, to guarantee them a minimum standard of living and help them become self-supporting. Markdown: https://japanlaw.org/md/en/public-assistance-act
- [医師法 / Medical Practitioners' Act](https://japanlaw.org/en/medical-practitioners-act): 昭和二十三年法律第二百一号 · Act (法律) · text in force since 2026-05-21 · 52 articles in the main text · English: 100% of paragraphs. Who may practise medicine in Japan and on what terms: the national examination and licence for doctors (医師), clinical training of at least two years, the duties doctors owe their patients, and the discipline and penalties behind them. Markdown: https://japanlaw.org/md/en/medical-practitioners-act
- [医療法 / Medical Care Act](https://japanlaw.org/en/medical-care-act): 昭和二十三年法律第二百五号 · Act (法律) · text in force since 2026-10-01 · 321 articles in the main text · English: 100% of paragraphs. The rules for hospitals, clinics and birthing centers: what each is, how one is opened and managed, what patients are told, the safety of care, the prefectures' medical care plans, and medical corporations. Markdown: https://japanlaw.org/md/en/medical-care-act

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