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The number of applications for welfare benefits totaled 255,897 in 2024, the highest since current tallying methods were adopted in 2013.

The amount rose by 818, or 0.3 percent, from 2023 for a fifth consecutive increase since 2020 amid the novel coronavirus pandemic, provisional welfare ministry statistics showed on March 5.

Until 2019, the number of applications was generally on the decline from 254,785 in 2013.

There were 18,551 applications in December, down by 144, or 0.8 percent, from a year earlier.

As of December, 1,652,199 households were on welfare.

Of those, 51.1 percent were households of a single person 65 or older.

Households headed by individuals who cannot work due to disabilities, injuries or disease accounted for 25.3 percent.

Single-mother households represented 3.8 percent.

Officials of the welfare ministry’s Public Assistance Division said the number of distressed single-member households appears to be increasing.

The ministry will raise the amount of welfare benefits by 500 yen ($3.30) a month per person under certain conditions from fiscal 2025 to cushion the impact of rising prices.

But less than 60 percent of recipient households will be eligible.

People on welfare and their supporters say the increase is inadequate.

Public assistance, known as the “last safety net” of social security, is designed to maintain the “minimum standards of wholesome and cultured living” guaranteed by the Constitution when people fall into dire poverty due to job loss, illnesses or other hardships.

When a household income falls short of the “minimum cost of living” set by the government even if savings and other assets are used, the shortfall is paid as welfare benefits.

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