Here’s a number to bring to your next argument about whether LGBTQ+ rights are “just a social issue”: ¥6.04 to ¥16.42 trillion a year.

That’s what the international business coalition Open for Business estimates LGBTQ+ exclusion costs Japan, in a new briefing called The Economic Case for LGBTQ+ Inclusion in Japan. In dollars, it’s $37.3 to $101.5 billion. As a share of the economy, 0.87% to 2.38% of GDP, every year.

The report was published on September 28 and picked up this week by the Washington Blade.

Where the money goes

The estimate has two parts:

  • ¥4.06–12.17 trillion a year in excess health costs, from depression, suicide and self-harm, cardiovascular disease and HIV/AIDS.
  • ¥1.98–4.25 trillion a year in lost earnings, from an LGBTQ+ wage gap the report puts at 7% to 15%.

The briefing’s two-page summary is blunt about it: “These are not hypothetical future losses — they are costs Japan’s economy, employers and public services are absorbing today.”

A quick reality check, because numbers this big deserve one. These are estimates built on a model, and the range is wide for a reason: the low and high ends reflect different assumptions. The full methodology is in the report. Also note that a few write-ups have printed the dollar figure incorrectly; the report’s own conversion is $37.3–101.5 billion.

Why Japan, why now

The report’s core argument is about people, not ideology. Japan’s population is projected to fall from roughly 125 million today to under 87 million by 2070. When the workforce is shrinking, every person who burns out, leaves a job, or hides who they are at work is a bigger loss.

“Japan doesn’t have workers to spare,” says Gon Matsunaka, a board member of Marriage for All Japan, quoted in the briefing. “With the population shrinking and the workforce already contracting, we can’t afford to leave anyone’s talent, health, or full participation on the table.”

The report also points to Japan’s split personality in global talent rankings: 14th of 69 economies for talent appeal, but 55th for talent readiness, in the IMD World Talent Ranking 2025. Its argument is that economies with stronger LGBTQ+ legal inclusion tend to do better at attracting and keeping talent.

The gap between companies and the law

This is where it gets interesting. Many big Japanese employers are already ahead of the government.

  • In 2025, 80% of the 931 organisations assessed under the PRIDE Index, Japan’s workplace inclusion benchmark, earned its highest certification.
  • But 55% of employees in the wider business sector say their workplace has no concrete LGBTQ+ measures at all.

So the problem isn’t that nobody’s trying. It’s that the protections depend on where you happen to work. The briefing’s own framing: “Public and corporate momentum is ahead of national law.”

Advocates told the Blade that’s the heart of it. “A law prohibiting discrimination based on SOGI has still not been enacted,” said Akira Nishiyama of the Japan Alliance for LGBT Legislation. Without one, Makiko Terahara of Marriage for All Japan said, employees “have no clear legal remedy.”

The public is already there

Support isn’t the bottleneck either:

  • 67% of people in Japan support marriage equality, according to the briefing. A large Dentsu survey this year found the same figure, Time Out Tokyo reported.
  • That Dentsu survey of 46,658 people aged 20 to 59 found about 10.6% identify as LGBTQ+, up from about 9.7% in 2023.
  • Local partnership systems now cover places where 93% of Japan’s population lives, the briefing says. They’re a real step, but they aren’t marriage, and they don’t come with national anti-discrimination protection. We looked at how those registries spread here.

What happens next

The big date on the calendar is the Supreme Court. In March, the court sent six marriage equality cases to its Grand Bench, where all 15 justices sit, and a ruling has been expected in early 2027. Here’s our explainer on what that decision could mean.

Meanwhile, the report’s ask is less dramatic than a court ruling, and arguably just as important: turn the progress that already exists into clearer legal protections and more consistent workplace practice, so being safe at work doesn’t depend on landing a job at one of the good companies.

Why it matters

Arguments for equality shouldn’t need a price tag. People deserve to be safe and treated fairly because they’re people.

But reports like this change who’s in the room. When a finance ministry or a CEO hears that exclusion is costing the country up to 2.38% of GDP a year, the conversation stops being about “culture wars” and starts being about a shrinking country that needs everyone. As the briefing puts it, LGBTQ+ inclusion “isn’t a side issue from Japan’s economic future, it’s a part of how we protect and strengthen it.”

For queer people in Japan, a lot of whom already show up to work, pay taxes and care for their families without equal legal protection, none of that is news. It’s nice to have the receipts.