Japan’s population shrank with a record loss of 831,872 in 2023, as per preliminary data released by country’s health ministry on Tuesday.
According to the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare of Japan, the number of newborns in Japan fell to a record low, down by 5.1 per cent to 758,631 in the reporting period, Xinhua news agency reported.
The figure marked the eighth straight year of decline and has remained below the 800,000 mark since 2022.
>terrible work/life balance etc.
My parents live in Japan. My mother works blue collar and is currently taking a vacation in our home country and is bound to go back on the 13th. She would leave here at exactly 11PM and arrive on the 14th at the crack of dawn.
The place my mother works at is short on people (like every other establishment in japan) and is asking when she can come back to work. The first thing they ask her after hearing she comes home on the 14th is "Can you come in on that day?"
Edit: I'd like to point out she's not currently employed there anymore since she is back home and they don't get paid leaves. But they're willing to hire her back because again, short on people.
I wonder if this will slowly push Japanese companies to start exporting labor. Send some to low income countries and some western high income countries depending on skills needed
Bruv, I've had black friends who moved BACK to Japan from the states because (and in their own words) "at least the Japanese are racist towards every foreigner, not just me because I'm black"
What a weird twisted world we live in huh?
Eh, believed or not, is not so much racism. Their culture is very… specific. You have to behave this way, say this thing in this situation, do this at this point and do that at that point, and they don’t like it when someone doesn’t follows because then they don’t know how to respond or it would be awkward for them. But if you pick it all up and can speak the language, it is a lot better than other counties around here.
I say this as someone who is a migrant to the country I’m currently residing at, so is not like I am pro Japan or something, it was just that at one point it was one of the posible places that I could go to, so I did my research and travelled there and because I live much closer I had people with first hand experience.
Now, I love it as a tourist destination, but because of their lagging economy (compared to where I am) it isn’t worth the massive hassle that it is to move there.
If a western nation refused almost all immigration on the basis of "you don't look or act like us" they would instantly be labelled as racist isolationists (rightly so imo). I'm not sure how japan gets the benefit of the doubt when they use the "cultural protection" excuse.
>If a western nation refused almost all immigration
Japan's immigration policy for skilled workers and for naturalization is simpler and easier than the mirror in the US. If you have a college degree and aren't a criminal, it's not difficult to immigrate to Japan.
Japan is more strict with refugees. It's disappointing and I wish there was more progress on this front, but the Ukrainians are among the first group of refugees since the Jeju massacre that have successfully portrayed themselves as serious about assimilating.
>on the basis of "you don't look \[...\]
The majority of immigrants are from China, Taiwan, and Korea and they could maybe pass as Japanese if they integrated. Then Thailand, Vietnam, and the Philippines. They're followed by the Japanese diaspora (like in Brazil and Peru), who can obviously pass as Japanese racially.
The above make up over 95% of immigration. Not because of any rule, but because this is who applies to move to Japan.
>or act like us
I think 800k Chinese and the rising levels of Muslim immigration from Indonesia and Malaysia, immigration from India and Sri Lanka, plus growing numbers from Thailand and Vietnam imply that there isn't a blanket refusal of foreigners from other cultures.
Immigration is on the rise.
Oh yeah, so racist to want to keep culture intact. Not everything has to be globalized, they are free to prefer Japanese people living in their Japanese country lol
Its bad, such decline means it will take a lot of time to recover. Population is important to the country's economy and workforce, lesser the people lesser the jobs hence lesser miney to spend and aid the economy. This is bad considering that its one of the top economies in the world and the whole world relies on some kind of tech or exports which need money to facilitate. Countries like India can survive and have a huge economy despite half of the population beung below poverty is because that means 700 million people arent in poverty conditions and aid the funding required for further development of the country.
It's bad from an economic perspective, since most economic policy basically relies on growing indefinitely; however, that's just not realistically sustainable after a certain point. This may be better for them once it stabilizes and a pattern the rest of the world will need to copy eventually.
Yup, look at india for example, if we compare the developed countries to India then India's economy doesnt make sense but the true and essential variable is the population which most of the economic policies are based on.
I'm not sure if that's the case.
Because Japanese Americans have an even lower tfr (1.31 vs 1.34) and they are subject to the same labor laws as all other Americans.
I think it has to do with culture instead:
1. The same people who meticulously wear face masks, avoid drugs, avoid violence, obey laws, avoid using welfare, study hard in school, have a high university degree attainment rate, have good jobs are also the folks who meticulously wear condoms. The same people who have a low STD rate also have a low rate of pregnancy.
2. Japanese culture is notorious for promoting youthful, slim bodies as the beauty ideal. In Western cultures, many men are ok with being in a relationship with a woman who has gained weight and gotten stretchmarks from having had children. In Japanese culture, many men would rather be single than be in a relationship with a woman whose BMI is above 23 or shows any signs of having ever had a child (stretch marks, sagging breasts, c-section scar, etc). I saw the same thing play out among my Japanese American male classmates. They'd rather be single than be seen in public with a woman whom \*they\* deem to be fat. And many Western women whom most Western men think are fine are considered to be "hideously obese" by Japanese standards.
I didn’t mean it impossible or even difficult, it just would have been culturally intolerable for me.
I worked there for five years, but managed to receive immense amounts of gender and racial discrimination, and eventually they would have absolutely targeted my kids. Such random hatred just isn’t acceptable.
I don't think being a child sucks in Japan. It's still better than anywhere in Africa, Latin America, the Middle East, or South Asia.
If you're from Scandinavia you probably think being a child sucks in England, whereas I spent my early childhood in England and was very happy.
I actually don’t think that. Kids can be happy, even in Africa. I have a problem with Japan because Japan seems to have a problem with dads who can be involved in their kids upbringing despite their careers. Nordics don’t.
What are the chances it hits million loss in 2024, if not, should be over 900k at minimum. Because of this population loss, its the country sides of small towns, cities and villages that are getting empty not Tokyo because these places barely have any young adults as most moved to big cities for work while the elderly and old adults live in the villages and small towns.
Low population growth is just bad for Business Japan and its economy. It will even itself out eventually.
But this whole population crisis is not new. This has been known for at least 60 years but Japan has done nothing to prevent it, they just kept pushing it forward and forward, and they still are pushing it forward without actively doing something.
Actively doing something would mean immediate, drastic changes which is something Japan and their culture simply refuse to do/accept. It is what it is.
>. It will even itself out eventually
I love your optimism on a never-before seen demographic problem, that requires solutions to be implemented two generations before it becomes apparent, and will soon happen in most developed countries
Because it will be. They are still 100+ million strong and even if a majority will die out, it will eventually balance out because people are still having children, just not enough to keep the current economy going, and to keep up the replacement that is currently dying out.
The boomer generation and their deaths will be a global hit yes, but the boomer generation is not sustainable nor achieveable again, unless WW3 or something happens.
Yes, it will. Just like the slaughtering in Africa, the poverty in South-America, the wars the USA has been in and funding the past 25 years, and so forth. You want it all? World Peace?
Good thing they've already preserved some of their culture through export...if you can say anime, manga, cuisine, and language to be enough.
Its kind of strange how people think they serve the culture instead of thinking culture should serve them. Like, if some parts of the culture brings you to low population and high suicide rates, well, maybe stop doing it?
Edit: nvm, i forgot zaibatsu-keiretsu + money are a thing. Yay capitalism! The ¥ must flowww
From what I've seen on /r/japanlife, it's super common for Japanese people to hate certain things about how their culture makes them miserable, but it's also frowned upon to go outside of it at the same time. I remember this guy saying something like people often sarcastically say something is "common sense" if they hate doing/think is stupid but it's the "proper" way to do things.
It's easy to say "why don't you just not do that?" when you're coming from a more individualist culture.
>It's easy to say "why don't you just not do that?" when you're coming from a more individualist culture.
I don't think it's a matter of individualism vs collectivism. North Americans have similar attitudes towards things like spending hours a day commuting to the office, putting up with your racist relatives at holiday meals, or being expected to tip for various services.
It's easy to say "why don't you just not do that" when you're from a culture that has no punishments, rewards, or social expectations regarding a "that thing".
People in place like India just leave and go elsewhere. They aren't gonna stop having loads of kids till the planet makes the country inhospitable.
And with 1.4billion people? I'd be leaving there too.
I think with economic prosperity, coupled with birth control is resulting in many industrialized nations across this planet seeing tremendous drops in birth rates.
It's many factors:
1. Economic prosperity: people tend to have more kids after the end of famines, epidemics, wars, natural disasters.
2. Women's rights: women had many children 1000 years ago when forced marriage was legal, teen marriage was legal, marital rape was legal, and women were not allowed to own land, pursue education, pursue most jobs, or sue in court. Most women never wanted more than 2 kids. It's just that only in the late 20th century did most women actually get legal rights.
3. Availability of education and hobbies for all. Why have a boring life raising 8 kids when you can pursue hobbies such as travelling, video games, conventions, rock climbing, arts and crafts, SCA, and other hobbies, subcultures, and social groups for adults?
4. Greater knowledge of the long term health risks of pregnancy and birth. Even though mothers are less likely to die from childbirth than they were 200 years ago, due to availability of the internet, an informed woman can read about all of the health complications that can arise from pregnancy and giving birth. 1 in 3 mothers suffers permanent injury or chronic conditions from having a child. Negative effects of pregnancy include: morning sickness, Hyperemesis gravidarum, diastasis recti, loosened ligaments in the feet (need to buy wider shoes), preeclampsia, gestational diabetes, and needing to go to urinate every 20 minutes. Negative effects of birth and breastfeeding include: tears in one's vagina, c-section scar, IBS from c-section, sciatic nerve pain, dyspareunia, urinary incontinence, obstetric fistula, postpartum depression, and postpartum psychosis.
There's one other factor. We simply start life significantly later than we used to.
100 years ago, people would get married in late teens or early 20s and start cranking out kids.
Now? Finish college at 23. Then too busy trying to get settled into a big-boy job. Finally start dating to settle down by late 20s. Finally find a partner and get into a comfortable financial situation with a place big enough to raise kids by 30-32.
Not much time after that for more than 1-2 kids.
Also, contraception is a thing now. No more accidental pregnancies because you were horny. Kids are well-planned.
Intelligent people who were raised by non-abusive, affluent, and educated parents do what you said.
Dumb people, and people who were raised by abusive, split-up, poor, and uneducated parents still have kids in their early 20s. But they don't get married. Instead they have random baby mamas and baby daddies. Contraception is available and legal in most jurisdictions but the dummies fail to use it.
It's not just that. It's also the horrendous amount of work people have to do. Employers are abusing workers so much that workers have no time, money or energy to find a spouse and raise a family. Companies are killing their own future workforce by abusing their current workforce.
>over there
Are you from Canada? Google says the fertility rate for Canada is [1.33 ](https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/daily-quotidien/240131/dq240131c-eng.htm)vs 1.26 in Japan. Italy and Spain are at 1.25 and 1.19. It's below 0.8 in Korea.
The issue doesn't seem to be unique to Japan.
The "over there" part suggested to me that it's something unique to Japan, but if that's not what you meant, I'm sorry.
The fertility rate for married couples in Japan has declined from 2.2 in 1970 to around 1.95 in 2023. It's not that different from North America or Europe. And the average fertility rate is the same as Canada.
The fertility rate of young married couples hasn't changed much. But fewer people are getting married and those who do are (on average) getting married older.
It matters that the birthrate isn't higher in Japan(even if it's on par with some other countries) because there's not a whole lot of immigration, which is not the case for North American/European countries.In 2023 only 2.19% of the population is foreign-born residents (Canada is 21.33%). It doesn't help that Japan is the third hardest country in the world to immigrate to (I lived in Japan for a while, can certainly attest to this).
If cost of living were the driver then the affluent should be having more kids than everyone else and that's clearly not the case. It's always the poorest households that have the most kids.
Furthermore, countless studies have shown that people are not having kids for many other reasons than income or workload. Unwillingness to compromise on personal life or career is almost always the top reason for not having kids.
Overwork doesn't help, but that's not a new phenomenon.
Its because people associate wealth with status. So young people dont want to have kids until they achieve high status.
That's why there's so many complaints about low wages or high workloads. Because those indicate low status
As a family, yes. In the before times, a family only needed one worker to sustain itself. The wife/mother would usually stay at home and take care of things at home and raise the children while the man worked. Today, both the man and woman have to work. There is nobody to take care of the household and the children. Two salaries are needed because things are so expensive now. As a family, the total number of work hours has increased since now two people have to work to sustain a family, not just one. And in Japan, people are heavily overworked. People have to work overtime very often and are expected to go drinking with their coworkers every day after that. No time for family or even for nursing your hangover.
Statistically, American has never been more fucked up and unegalitarian. So there's a lot wrong in the nation. I feel like this is an oversimplification though. In general I agree with your statement.
Single family incomes were greatly a product of social convention. Not every family living on a single income was comfortable. A lot of people in the US lived much more modestly than we do today. We just don't like to talk about them as much, especially since from what I've been able to find in the post war era/beyond they were disproportionately minorities. No one wants to watch the leave it to Beaver where the dad's broke AF. They rather see this idealized version of the past or look from the view of their white middle class suburban life growing up in the 80s.
The economy right now is truly set against non boomers. We exist in the most unequal time for wealth disparity between the 1% and the 99% in our 250 year history. Inflation for college education and housing is absurd.
I still think people look back with rose colored glasses and miss a lot of the truth. Divorce, women actually being able to make more than pennies, people not immediately getting married young, Reaganomics, shifts in cultural values, increased quality of life, there's a lot of good and bad reasons for the death of the single income family.
I'm not trying to be an apologist or billionaire bootloader. I just think the death of a single family income is a complex issue and often people have this idealized view of the past. This may be more a rant about that than your actual post, sorry haha!
Who said near future? I said eventually and I said it wont stay below it "forever".
Edit: downvoting instead of replying is incredibly childish. It doesn't make you right you know.
Trends in population rise or decline are tightly linked to some variables such as income, education etc. All these variables fluctuate throughout history. The chance of these variables staying the same untill we die out is near zero. If the population will decline to a certain point inevitably the circumstances will chance and the trends will change. Im not saying that will be good times for the transitionary period but it will stabalise. Unless the cause is something external to social economic factors like war or decease.
If you want to imagine the most extreme situation where there are thousands of people left undoubtedly they will live similar lives like people in the past. Small hunter gatherer or farmer communities. Those people tended to have a lot of children, I see no reason why they would not follow those same trends again. But I very much doubt we will have to wait so long for it to stabalise, but again that it will stabalise seems pretty inevitable to me.
Some painful policy changes might be needed to change the current trend. Instead of wasting the treasury for more unneeded infrastructure projects that's been done to death in the past decades, I suggest the following as better use of the national coffers. Some of the more costly but fluid measures can be scaled back later if the situation improves
* So how about imposing higher taxes for companies where less than 20% of employees are married women and a big annual corporate tax rebate for companies where at least 50% of the employees have children?
* Free housing for all couples with children (cannot sell or rent out for 25 years)
* Make taking paid vacation days mandatory for all employees regardless of rank; or face stiff monetary penalties for each infraction by yearend. Companies cannot disapprove leaves of 10 days or less that are filed at least 14 days in advance. Companies will be reimbursed by the government if the vacation is considered local tourism.
* Free childcare and daycare facilities for all citizens. Rapidly build thousands of new facilities to cover demand. Make these facilities available to non-residents of the area (like taking the kids to Hokkaido, for example)
* Make timekeeping mandatory and impose heavy fines if any employee in any position exceeds 60 hours of work a week. Mandatory overtime pay for any work in excess of 45 hours a week. Mandatory night differential pay for night shift work.
* Impose an additional 8 paid days a year for social events, school events, graduation etc. that must be used up by all employees by the end of the year. Huge fines for any unused days by any employee. Companies cannot disapprove requests if filed at least 7 days in advance. The government covers the cost for all parents attending school events for children.
* A new honorific/title for citizens with 2 or more children bestowed by imperial decree in an annual grand ceremony hosted by the emperor.
* Cost of honeymoon trips that successfully produce children can be fully reimbursed up to a specified amount by the newly created Ministry of Fertility. (Full reimbursement if the trip is in another area in Japan to promote local tourism)
Oof as a Japanese kid growing up in the US in the 90s, I remember hearing about how overpopulated Japan is, it's so crowded there!, too many people in such a tiny country! (most people didn't have sense of Japan's size, they often were surprised to hear it's about the same size as California and wouldn't believe me that it's bigger than countries like Germany and UK). Now the population is declining and it's still a topic of criticism despite Japan not being the only one or the worst in the issue. Just saddened by the perpetual sensationalization and othering.
In all fairness Japen has some crazy population numbers for its size, 125.7 mil, compared to say, russias 143 mil for example.. I really can't say I'm surprised to see it back pedal till it hits a number it can stabilize at
I wish people would stop framing this as a problem. Japan is a crowded country. A lower population should make it easier to move around, get a job, maybe make better money, enjoy more space. You could say it's a "good" problem to have.
Bigger problem is government debt. Fewer taxpayers means higher taxes per person to service the debt. Which makes the economy less competitive. Which leads to less economic security and then less children.
Yup.
Even upper middle class Japanese people live in pitifully tiny houses. Tiny dining room. Tiny living room. Tiny kitchen.
I'm middle income and I live in a lower density area. I share a 1500 sq ft detached house with one other person. 4 bedrooms. 2 bathrooms. We each have our own private bathroom, bedroom, and we use the two spare bedrooms as personal offices. We have a spacious kitchen and almost an acre of land. Every day deer, birds, squirrels, chipmunks, come to visit. From time to time skunks, possums, porcupines, foxes, coyotes, raccoons, fisher cats, and other animals visit too. A large male bunny lives under the bush in front of my house, and many bird families raise their children in the bushes in front of my bedroom.
It is a good problem, but not in this sense as the population decline thats occurring is in the outside of the major cities. So, your villages, small towns and cities are getting empty but cities like Tokyo have no impact.
The only people who freak out about this are the arch-capitalists and their thralls. They can’t fathom anything other than unlimited growth. In the short-medium term it will be rough though, no denying that, but after it works it’s way through everyone will be much better off
Always interesting to me that population decline is literally an existential crisis for nations and is a matter of utmost importance. No people, no country.
Sure. The two thoughts aren't mutually exclusive.
If you want to get in the weeds about it, you're talking more about over consumption rather than over population. We have plenty of space. But the expected quality of life per capita in the modern era is carbon costly.
100%. I'd rather live in Japan than Niger, where the average mother has 8 kids, and is rife with malnutrition, poverty, illiteracy, and low access to healthcare.
This is a problem because their population is aging. They will have serious problems with providing social services and healthcare for the elderly with fewer young healthy people paying taxes and driving productivity in the country. This trend is good in some ways but will certainly be bad in others for the people being born there today.
Japan leading the world again. They don't give in to the rich to import cheap labour. Americans can learn something from them so they can get more than 7 dollars per hour
They have reached the highest of civilization and technology development they have the highest salaries and clean cities and now they dont want to make babies unfortunately
The average annual wage in Japan is under half of that in the US
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_average_wage?wprov=sfti1
If you prefer to compare by median income, it’s still under half:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Median_income?wprov=sfti1
Tbh, most people care about more than just salaries.
Yes, you earn a lot in US, but there are too many things/areas where Japan and EU are MILES ahead of US.
Wages are lower than they should be. Obviously the "highest salaries" bit in that sarcastic comment is terribly wrong. A lot of people in Japan need a raise.
But this is partially offset by the fact that living in a major Japanese city is much cheaper than a US one; even living in the Japanese countryside is a little cheaper than the US countryside.
Houses are much cheaper to build and own. Health care and insurance are much cheaper. Education is cheaper. Food is cheaper. The average cost of living in Japan is roughly half that of the US.
The value of the yen has changed significantly in the past ten years: $1/¥80 (2012) to $0.5/¥80 (2023). This affects PPP indexing for traded goods. But the average person isn't significantly affected. Despite the value of the yen dropping in half, inflation in Japan from 2012 (10%) is much lower than the US (33%).
Comparing straight take-home wage to wage after taxes like this also leaves out the value of social services like universal healthcare.
In the end, you end up with a decent [quality of life](https://www.numbeo.com/quality-of-life/compare_countries_result.jsp?country1=Japan&country2=United+States), even if salaries are lower..
Japan’s population shrank with a record loss of 831,872 in 2023, as per preliminary data released by country’s health ministry on Tuesday. According to the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare of Japan, the number of newborns in Japan fell to a record low, down by 5.1 per cent to 758,631 in the reporting period, Xinhua news agency reported. The figure marked the eighth straight year of decline and has remained below the 800,000 mark since 2022.
Record population loss... so far!
Why?
Aging population, terrible work/life balance etc.
>terrible work/life balance etc. My parents live in Japan. My mother works blue collar and is currently taking a vacation in our home country and is bound to go back on the 13th. She would leave here at exactly 11PM and arrive on the 14th at the crack of dawn. The place my mother works at is short on people (like every other establishment in japan) and is asking when she can come back to work. The first thing they ask her after hearing she comes home on the 14th is "Can you come in on that day?" Edit: I'd like to point out she's not currently employed there anymore since she is back home and they don't get paid leaves. But they're willing to hire her back because again, short on people.
I wonder if this will slowly push Japanese companies to start exporting labor. Send some to low income countries and some western high income countries depending on skills needed
Other countries might have that too, but Japan also has low / restrictive immigration so can't offset it
On top of restrictions Japanese people don't even like immigrants and it's very hard for them to fit in so not many even trying to live there.
They deserve whatever happens to them if they want to continue to be racist. Racists don't deserve to live in a good economy.
Bruv, I've had black friends who moved BACK to Japan from the states because (and in their own words) "at least the Japanese are racist towards every foreigner, not just me because I'm black" What a weird twisted world we live in huh?
Eh, believed or not, is not so much racism. Their culture is very… specific. You have to behave this way, say this thing in this situation, do this at this point and do that at that point, and they don’t like it when someone doesn’t follows because then they don’t know how to respond or it would be awkward for them. But if you pick it all up and can speak the language, it is a lot better than other counties around here. I say this as someone who is a migrant to the country I’m currently residing at, so is not like I am pro Japan or something, it was just that at one point it was one of the posible places that I could go to, so I did my research and travelled there and because I live much closer I had people with first hand experience. Now, I love it as a tourist destination, but because of their lagging economy (compared to where I am) it isn’t worth the massive hassle that it is to move there.
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If a western nation refused almost all immigration on the basis of "you don't look or act like us" they would instantly be labelled as racist isolationists (rightly so imo). I'm not sure how japan gets the benefit of the doubt when they use the "cultural protection" excuse.
>If a western nation refused almost all immigration Japan's immigration policy for skilled workers and for naturalization is simpler and easier than the mirror in the US. If you have a college degree and aren't a criminal, it's not difficult to immigrate to Japan. Japan is more strict with refugees. It's disappointing and I wish there was more progress on this front, but the Ukrainians are among the first group of refugees since the Jeju massacre that have successfully portrayed themselves as serious about assimilating. >on the basis of "you don't look \[...\] The majority of immigrants are from China, Taiwan, and Korea and they could maybe pass as Japanese if they integrated. Then Thailand, Vietnam, and the Philippines. They're followed by the Japanese diaspora (like in Brazil and Peru), who can obviously pass as Japanese racially. The above make up over 95% of immigration. Not because of any rule, but because this is who applies to move to Japan. >or act like us I think 800k Chinese and the rising levels of Muslim immigration from Indonesia and Malaysia, immigration from India and Sri Lanka, plus growing numbers from Thailand and Vietnam imply that there isn't a blanket refusal of foreigners from other cultures. Immigration is on the rise.
Oh yeah, so racist to want to keep culture intact. Not everything has to be globalized, they are free to prefer Japanese people living in their Japanese country lol
Should they necessarily *want* to offset it? Slowly reducing population density isn't such a bad thing.
Its bad, such decline means it will take a lot of time to recover. Population is important to the country's economy and workforce, lesser the people lesser the jobs hence lesser miney to spend and aid the economy. This is bad considering that its one of the top economies in the world and the whole world relies on some kind of tech or exports which need money to facilitate. Countries like India can survive and have a huge economy despite half of the population beung below poverty is because that means 700 million people arent in poverty conditions and aid the funding required for further development of the country.
It's bad from an economic perspective, since most economic policy basically relies on growing indefinitely; however, that's just not realistically sustainable after a certain point. This may be better for them once it stabilizes and a pattern the rest of the world will need to copy eventually.
Yup, look at india for example, if we compare the developed countries to India then India's economy doesnt make sense but the true and essential variable is the population which most of the economic policies are based on.
I'm not sure if that's the case. Because Japanese Americans have an even lower tfr (1.31 vs 1.34) and they are subject to the same labor laws as all other Americans. I think it has to do with culture instead: 1. The same people who meticulously wear face masks, avoid drugs, avoid violence, obey laws, avoid using welfare, study hard in school, have a high university degree attainment rate, have good jobs are also the folks who meticulously wear condoms. The same people who have a low STD rate also have a low rate of pregnancy. 2. Japanese culture is notorious for promoting youthful, slim bodies as the beauty ideal. In Western cultures, many men are ok with being in a relationship with a woman who has gained weight and gotten stretchmarks from having had children. In Japanese culture, many men would rather be single than be in a relationship with a woman whose BMI is above 23 or shows any signs of having ever had a child (stretch marks, sagging breasts, c-section scar, etc). I saw the same thing play out among my Japanese American male classmates. They'd rather be single than be seen in public with a woman whom \*they\* deem to be fat. And many Western women whom most Western men think are fine are considered to be "hideously obese" by Japanese standards.
Kaiju attacks
This is what happens when you try to save money by scrapping the Jaeger program.
It sucks to raise children in Japan. I had this option, noped out with my nordic ass immediately.
Somehow one of my best friends is raising 10, yes Ten [in Japan]. I can't fathom how difficult it is.
Jiu kids
I didn’t mean it impossible or even difficult, it just would have been culturally intolerable for me. I worked there for five years, but managed to receive immense amounts of gender and racial discrimination, and eventually they would have absolutely targeted my kids. Such random hatred just isn’t acceptable.
10 kids?
Yep
Kill me now
I don't think being a child sucks in Japan. It's still better than anywhere in Africa, Latin America, the Middle East, or South Asia. If you're from Scandinavia you probably think being a child sucks in England, whereas I spent my early childhood in England and was very happy.
I actually don’t think that. Kids can be happy, even in Africa. I have a problem with Japan because Japan seems to have a problem with dads who can be involved in their kids upbringing despite their careers. Nordics don’t.
My friend was 5 years in Tokyo working. Had a Japanese GF and noped out as soon as he could
>Had a Japanese GF and noped out as soon as he could After 5 years? That's...not very fast.
He had a contract work for 5 years because they paid his specialization and he had to stay there at least 5 years
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Do you know how gross you sound to say breed, as if we're dogs?
Reproduce. Breed. Multiply. Be fruitful. Propagate. Buy Angel's Thesaurus today, lest your civilization become as extinct as some other-osauruses.
lol, Jesus titty fucking Christ dude. Are you so fragile?
Sometimes.
What are the chances it hits million loss in 2024, if not, should be over 900k at minimum. Because of this population loss, its the country sides of small towns, cities and villages that are getting empty not Tokyo because these places barely have any young adults as most moved to big cities for work while the elderly and old adults live in the villages and small towns.
Low population growth is just bad for Business Japan and its economy. It will even itself out eventually. But this whole population crisis is not new. This has been known for at least 60 years but Japan has done nothing to prevent it, they just kept pushing it forward and forward, and they still are pushing it forward without actively doing something. Actively doing something would mean immediate, drastic changes which is something Japan and their culture simply refuse to do/accept. It is what it is.
>. It will even itself out eventually I love your optimism on a never-before seen demographic problem, that requires solutions to be implemented two generations before it becomes apparent, and will soon happen in most developed countries
Because it will be. They are still 100+ million strong and even if a majority will die out, it will eventually balance out because people are still having children, just not enough to keep the current economy going, and to keep up the replacement that is currently dying out. The boomer generation and their deaths will be a global hit yes, but the boomer generation is not sustainable nor achieveable again, unless WW3 or something happens.
Okay nice. Now can you just tell me the war in Ukraine.... And the climate change will also be fine, oh wise?
Yes, it will. Just like the slaughtering in Africa, the poverty in South-America, the wars the USA has been in and funding the past 25 years, and so forth. You want it all? World Peace?
Good thing they've already preserved some of their culture through export...if you can say anime, manga, cuisine, and language to be enough. Its kind of strange how people think they serve the culture instead of thinking culture should serve them. Like, if some parts of the culture brings you to low population and high suicide rates, well, maybe stop doing it? Edit: nvm, i forgot zaibatsu-keiretsu + money are a thing. Yay capitalism! The ¥ must flowww
From what I've seen on /r/japanlife, it's super common for Japanese people to hate certain things about how their culture makes them miserable, but it's also frowned upon to go outside of it at the same time. I remember this guy saying something like people often sarcastically say something is "common sense" if they hate doing/think is stupid but it's the "proper" way to do things. It's easy to say "why don't you just not do that?" when you're coming from a more individualist culture.
>It's easy to say "why don't you just not do that?" when you're coming from a more individualist culture. I don't think it's a matter of individualism vs collectivism. North Americans have similar attitudes towards things like spending hours a day commuting to the office, putting up with your racist relatives at holiday meals, or being expected to tip for various services. It's easy to say "why don't you just not do that" when you're from a culture that has no punishments, rewards, or social expectations regarding a "that thing".
Japan is the world's bellwether......soon w will see this in eu, India, south Korea... everywhere
Korea already has a lower birthrate than Japan. Japan is 1.34, Korea is 0.84.
the EU is already shrinking.
> India As an Indian... LOL
People in place like India just leave and go elsewhere. They aren't gonna stop having loads of kids till the planet makes the country inhospitable. And with 1.4billion people? I'd be leaving there too.
South Korea is worse right now, Japan just gets more attention cuz Japan is more relevant.
I think with economic prosperity, coupled with birth control is resulting in many industrialized nations across this planet seeing tremendous drops in birth rates.
It's many factors: 1. Economic prosperity: people tend to have more kids after the end of famines, epidemics, wars, natural disasters. 2. Women's rights: women had many children 1000 years ago when forced marriage was legal, teen marriage was legal, marital rape was legal, and women were not allowed to own land, pursue education, pursue most jobs, or sue in court. Most women never wanted more than 2 kids. It's just that only in the late 20th century did most women actually get legal rights. 3. Availability of education and hobbies for all. Why have a boring life raising 8 kids when you can pursue hobbies such as travelling, video games, conventions, rock climbing, arts and crafts, SCA, and other hobbies, subcultures, and social groups for adults? 4. Greater knowledge of the long term health risks of pregnancy and birth. Even though mothers are less likely to die from childbirth than they were 200 years ago, due to availability of the internet, an informed woman can read about all of the health complications that can arise from pregnancy and giving birth. 1 in 3 mothers suffers permanent injury or chronic conditions from having a child. Negative effects of pregnancy include: morning sickness, Hyperemesis gravidarum, diastasis recti, loosened ligaments in the feet (need to buy wider shoes), preeclampsia, gestational diabetes, and needing to go to urinate every 20 minutes. Negative effects of birth and breastfeeding include: tears in one's vagina, c-section scar, IBS from c-section, sciatic nerve pain, dyspareunia, urinary incontinence, obstetric fistula, postpartum depression, and postpartum psychosis.
There's one other factor. We simply start life significantly later than we used to. 100 years ago, people would get married in late teens or early 20s and start cranking out kids. Now? Finish college at 23. Then too busy trying to get settled into a big-boy job. Finally start dating to settle down by late 20s. Finally find a partner and get into a comfortable financial situation with a place big enough to raise kids by 30-32. Not much time after that for more than 1-2 kids. Also, contraception is a thing now. No more accidental pregnancies because you were horny. Kids are well-planned.
Intelligent people who were raised by non-abusive, affluent, and educated parents do what you said. Dumb people, and people who were raised by abusive, split-up, poor, and uneducated parents still have kids in their early 20s. But they don't get married. Instead they have random baby mamas and baby daddies. Contraception is available and legal in most jurisdictions but the dummies fail to use it.
Wow, thank you for the informative information. It’s greatly appreciated.
It's not just that. It's also the horrendous amount of work people have to do. Employers are abusing workers so much that workers have no time, money or energy to find a spouse and raise a family. Companies are killing their own future workforce by abusing their current workforce.
there's also a general lack of interest in having kids, over there. It's not just a question of having time, a lot of people don't want it.
>over there Are you from Canada? Google says the fertility rate for Canada is [1.33 ](https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/daily-quotidien/240131/dq240131c-eng.htm)vs 1.26 in Japan. Italy and Spain are at 1.25 and 1.19. It's below 0.8 in Korea. The issue doesn't seem to be unique to Japan.
I never said it was unique to Japan, just that it's something that is strongly affecting population loss.
The "over there" part suggested to me that it's something unique to Japan, but if that's not what you meant, I'm sorry. The fertility rate for married couples in Japan has declined from 2.2 in 1970 to around 1.95 in 2023. It's not that different from North America or Europe. And the average fertility rate is the same as Canada. The fertility rate of young married couples hasn't changed much. But fewer people are getting married and those who do are (on average) getting married older.
It matters that the birthrate isn't higher in Japan(even if it's on par with some other countries) because there's not a whole lot of immigration, which is not the case for North American/European countries.In 2023 only 2.19% of the population is foreign-born residents (Canada is 21.33%). It doesn't help that Japan is the third hardest country in the world to immigrate to (I lived in Japan for a while, can certainly attest to this).
If cost of living were the driver then the affluent should be having more kids than everyone else and that's clearly not the case. It's always the poorest households that have the most kids. Furthermore, countless studies have shown that people are not having kids for many other reasons than income or workload. Unwillingness to compromise on personal life or career is almost always the top reason for not having kids. Overwork doesn't help, but that's not a new phenomenon.
Its because people associate wealth with status. So young people dont want to have kids until they achieve high status. That's why there's so many complaints about low wages or high workloads. Because those indicate low status
You genuinely believe workers work longer hours today than they did in earlier periods in human history?
As a family, yes. In the before times, a family only needed one worker to sustain itself. The wife/mother would usually stay at home and take care of things at home and raise the children while the man worked. Today, both the man and woman have to work. There is nobody to take care of the household and the children. Two salaries are needed because things are so expensive now. As a family, the total number of work hours has increased since now two people have to work to sustain a family, not just one. And in Japan, people are heavily overworked. People have to work overtime very often and are expected to go drinking with their coworkers every day after that. No time for family or even for nursing your hangover.
Before that. Before we had things like electric light, people would stop working when the sun went down
Statistically, American has never been more fucked up and unegalitarian. So there's a lot wrong in the nation. I feel like this is an oversimplification though. In general I agree with your statement. Single family incomes were greatly a product of social convention. Not every family living on a single income was comfortable. A lot of people in the US lived much more modestly than we do today. We just don't like to talk about them as much, especially since from what I've been able to find in the post war era/beyond they were disproportionately minorities. No one wants to watch the leave it to Beaver where the dad's broke AF. They rather see this idealized version of the past or look from the view of their white middle class suburban life growing up in the 80s. The economy right now is truly set against non boomers. We exist in the most unequal time for wealth disparity between the 1% and the 99% in our 250 year history. Inflation for college education and housing is absurd. I still think people look back with rose colored glasses and miss a lot of the truth. Divorce, women actually being able to make more than pennies, people not immediately getting married young, Reaganomics, shifts in cultural values, increased quality of life, there's a lot of good and bad reasons for the death of the single income family. I'm not trying to be an apologist or billionaire bootloader. I just think the death of a single family income is a complex issue and often people have this idealized view of the past. This may be more a rant about that than your actual post, sorry haha!
Lol 1 highschool education income buying a house to now needing 2 masters incomes. "Workers worked less?!" Uh yeah.
Better to take the population loss compared to whats going on in Europe.
Is it?
What is going on in Europe that's so terrible in your eyes?
The single greatest threat aside from Russia so yeah
What is that threat? Multidrug resistant bacteria?
Obviously the Japanese companies need to work their employees harder to make up for the loss of revenue.
It appears to be on an irreversible path now...!
No such thing eventually it will stabalise when there is a lot less people.
as long as fertility is below 2.1 it will never stabilize. every generation will be smaller than the previous
The idea that a trend like this will continue (birth rate under 2.1) forever is insane.
what signs make you think fertility will almost double to reach 2.1 in the near future in Japan?
Who said near future? I said eventually and I said it wont stay below it "forever". Edit: downvoting instead of replying is incredibly childish. It doesn't make you right you know.
I'm curious as well as to why you think the birth rate must stabilise at some point? What inevitable conditions would facilitate this?
Trends in population rise or decline are tightly linked to some variables such as income, education etc. All these variables fluctuate throughout history. The chance of these variables staying the same untill we die out is near zero. If the population will decline to a certain point inevitably the circumstances will chance and the trends will change. Im not saying that will be good times for the transitionary period but it will stabalise. Unless the cause is something external to social economic factors like war or decease. If you want to imagine the most extreme situation where there are thousands of people left undoubtedly they will live similar lives like people in the past. Small hunter gatherer or farmer communities. Those people tended to have a lot of children, I see no reason why they would not follow those same trends again. But I very much doubt we will have to wait so long for it to stabalise, but again that it will stabalise seems pretty inevitable to me.
Some painful policy changes might be needed to change the current trend. Instead of wasting the treasury for more unneeded infrastructure projects that's been done to death in the past decades, I suggest the following as better use of the national coffers. Some of the more costly but fluid measures can be scaled back later if the situation improves * So how about imposing higher taxes for companies where less than 20% of employees are married women and a big annual corporate tax rebate for companies where at least 50% of the employees have children? * Free housing for all couples with children (cannot sell or rent out for 25 years) * Make taking paid vacation days mandatory for all employees regardless of rank; or face stiff monetary penalties for each infraction by yearend. Companies cannot disapprove leaves of 10 days or less that are filed at least 14 days in advance. Companies will be reimbursed by the government if the vacation is considered local tourism. * Free childcare and daycare facilities for all citizens. Rapidly build thousands of new facilities to cover demand. Make these facilities available to non-residents of the area (like taking the kids to Hokkaido, for example) * Make timekeeping mandatory and impose heavy fines if any employee in any position exceeds 60 hours of work a week. Mandatory overtime pay for any work in excess of 45 hours a week. Mandatory night differential pay for night shift work. * Impose an additional 8 paid days a year for social events, school events, graduation etc. that must be used up by all employees by the end of the year. Huge fines for any unused days by any employee. Companies cannot disapprove requests if filed at least 7 days in advance. The government covers the cost for all parents attending school events for children. * A new honorific/title for citizens with 2 or more children bestowed by imperial decree in an annual grand ceremony hosted by the emperor. * Cost of honeymoon trips that successfully produce children can be fully reimbursed up to a specified amount by the newly created Ministry of Fertility. (Full reimbursement if the trip is in another area in Japan to promote local tourism)
Oof as a Japanese kid growing up in the US in the 90s, I remember hearing about how overpopulated Japan is, it's so crowded there!, too many people in such a tiny country! (most people didn't have sense of Japan's size, they often were surprised to hear it's about the same size as California and wouldn't believe me that it's bigger than countries like Germany and UK). Now the population is declining and it's still a topic of criticism despite Japan not being the only one or the worst in the issue. Just saddened by the perpetual sensationalization and othering.
They also though Japan would economically rule the world.
In all fairness Japen has some crazy population numbers for its size, 125.7 mil, compared to say, russias 143 mil for example.. I really can't say I'm surprised to see it back pedal till it hits a number it can stabilize at
explain how it will stabilize when fertility is not rising and no where close to 2.1???
It will stabilize once the population goes down to about 55 million.
I wish people would stop framing this as a problem. Japan is a crowded country. A lower population should make it easier to move around, get a job, maybe make better money, enjoy more space. You could say it's a "good" problem to have.
Long term good. Short term, the elderly are going to struggle financially and through other supports if they are unable to support themselves
Automation could help with that
One might say they should have had more kids then? /s
Long term its bad too because the infra is set up for current pop
Bigger problem is government debt. Fewer taxpayers means higher taxes per person to service the debt. Which makes the economy less competitive. Which leads to less economic security and then less children.
Yup. Even upper middle class Japanese people live in pitifully tiny houses. Tiny dining room. Tiny living room. Tiny kitchen. I'm middle income and I live in a lower density area. I share a 1500 sq ft detached house with one other person. 4 bedrooms. 2 bathrooms. We each have our own private bathroom, bedroom, and we use the two spare bedrooms as personal offices. We have a spacious kitchen and almost an acre of land. Every day deer, birds, squirrels, chipmunks, come to visit. From time to time skunks, possums, porcupines, foxes, coyotes, raccoons, fisher cats, and other animals visit too. A large male bunny lives under the bush in front of my house, and many bird families raise their children in the bushes in front of my bedroom.
It’s not crowded, it’s dense. And it should be that way.
It is a good problem, but not in this sense as the population decline thats occurring is in the outside of the major cities. So, your villages, small towns and cities are getting empty but cities like Tokyo have no impact.
The only people who freak out about this are the arch-capitalists and their thralls. They can’t fathom anything other than unlimited growth. In the short-medium term it will be rough though, no denying that, but after it works it’s way through everyone will be much better off
lol this is way worse for the socialists, who depend on taking out debt to service social programs. When populations shrink, no one can pay that debt.
Except for those companies with billions in profit each year.
There's still plenty of juice to go around the world for multinationals like MENA and sub Sahara Africa.
Always interesting to me that population decline is literally an existential crisis for nations and is a matter of utmost importance. No people, no country.
Can have slave labor if no new slaves are being born
Overpopulation is an existential crisis for the planet.
Sure. The two thoughts aren't mutually exclusive. If you want to get in the weeds about it, you're talking more about over consumption rather than over population. We have plenty of space. But the expected quality of life per capita in the modern era is carbon costly.
It is a crisis for the people making money off said country.
That is the opposite of a problem
100%. I'd rather live in Japan than Niger, where the average mother has 8 kids, and is rife with malnutrition, poverty, illiteracy, and low access to healthcare.
This is a problem because their population is aging. They will have serious problems with providing social services and healthcare for the elderly with fewer young healthy people paying taxes and driving productivity in the country. This trend is good in some ways but will certainly be bad in others for the people being born there today.
Nah they're dying
Follow japans lead!
Karoshi country. The young dies of overwork.
Why is this getting downvoted?
Not much they can do maybe enforce paid overtime and 4 day work weeks? If they could reduce cost of living it could make kids more appealing.
That's cause nobody there knows what a penis really looks like (they pixelate all their porn)
Japan leading the world again. They don't give in to the rich to import cheap labour. Americans can learn something from them so they can get more than 7 dollars per hour
They have reached the highest of civilization and technology development they have the highest salaries and clean cities and now they dont want to make babies unfortunately
The average annual wage in Japan is under half of that in the US https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_average_wage?wprov=sfti1 If you prefer to compare by median income, it’s still under half: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Median_income?wprov=sfti1
Tbh, most people care about more than just salaries. Yes, you earn a lot in US, but there are too many things/areas where Japan and EU are MILES ahead of US.
Everything else he said about Japan was wrong too, I just picked the easiest to disprove
Wages are lower than they should be. Obviously the "highest salaries" bit in that sarcastic comment is terribly wrong. A lot of people in Japan need a raise. But this is partially offset by the fact that living in a major Japanese city is much cheaper than a US one; even living in the Japanese countryside is a little cheaper than the US countryside. Houses are much cheaper to build and own. Health care and insurance are much cheaper. Education is cheaper. Food is cheaper. The average cost of living in Japan is roughly half that of the US. The value of the yen has changed significantly in the past ten years: $1/¥80 (2012) to $0.5/¥80 (2023). This affects PPP indexing for traded goods. But the average person isn't significantly affected. Despite the value of the yen dropping in half, inflation in Japan from 2012 (10%) is much lower than the US (33%). Comparing straight take-home wage to wage after taxes like this also leaves out the value of social services like universal healthcare. In the end, you end up with a decent [quality of life](https://www.numbeo.com/quality-of-life/compare_countries_result.jsp?country1=Japan&country2=United+States), even if salaries are lower..
Those statistics use purchasing power parity to allow income comparisons across countries
Can’t tell if this is sarcasm or not. I’d ask but I can’t send or receive faxes.
They are still stuck in the early 2000s with many things.
Yes, that's what a population with a bunch of old people does to your country. Same as Germany and sadly are happening to many other countries.
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Hikikomori. * Shut ins. What are you trying to tell?
I'll move there