Yubaba's contract system works because it solves an employer's problem: how to eliminate the negotiating power of workers who know their own value.

She doesn't just take Chihiro's name — she replaces it with a number, a marker that severs the worker from her own continuity.

The moment the character accepts the new name, she stops having access to her former self. She can't remember what she was before and can't leverage that history in conversation. No-Face's workers operate the same way — hunched over, interchangeable, their faces obscured and normalized into fungibility because the contract has made them economically identical.

Watch the scene where Chihiro nearly forgets her name entirely while scrubbing. Miyazaki holds on her face going blank — this isn't mystical horror; it's the specific terror of realizing your identity has become a liability to your employer. The bathhouse's physical architecture enforces this through identical corridors, uniforms, and sleeping quarters, leaving no space for the self to persist.

The only escape is remembering your name before you sign because Yubaba can't revoke what you never gave her. Chihiro's victory isn't defeating Yubaba — it's maintaining her own internal consistency outside the contract, suggesting something darker: once you've traded your name for employment, there's no amount of corporate loyalty that restores it.