• Japan’s real wages fell the most in nearly nine years in January, official data showed, as four-decade-high inflation squeezed the purchasing power of consumers and undercut efforts by policymakers to revive a COVID-ravaged economy.
• Inflation-adjusted real wages, a barometer of households’ purchasing power, fell by 4.1% in January from a year earlier, the largest decrease since May 2014, labour ministry data showed on Tuesday. It followed a revised 0.6% drop in December.