Japan's Population Falls At Fastest Rate Since 1968

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Reuters: Japan's population, excluding resident foreigners, fell at the beginning of this year at its fastest pace since comparable figures were kept in 1968, highlighting the demographic challenge to economic growth. As of Jan. 1, the number of Japanese people fell by a record 308,084 from a year earlier to 125,583,658, marking the eighth consecutive year of declines, government data showed Wednesday. The number of births fell 2.9 percent from the previous year ago to 981,202, the lowest since comparable data became available in 1974. People aged 65 or older accounted for 27.2 percent of the total population, the highest ratio on record, while the ratio of those aged 14 or younger fell to a record low of 12.7 percent, the data showed. The number of registered foreign residents increased to 2,323,428, up 6.9 percent from a year earlier, according to the data.

Comments

The US may be headed this way too

[ErichTheRed]

As a father of 2 kids, I've performed my evolutionary duty. :-) However, there are plenty of younger people in the US who aren't, and in my opinion they're being somewhat rational. Having kids is a big risk unless you just don't give a crap -- they cost a lot of money and you have to be much more careful about maintaining your income and savings than if you were on your own. Millenials are also skipping traditional adult rites of passage like marriage, house-buying, etc. that lay the groundwork for a family. Plus, those that do have kids are having fewer, later. Generally, people are less religious, have heard of birth control, and are less worried about child mortality, therefore less inclined to have "spare" children.

Japan has a few things that are really slowing their birthrate - almost zero permanent immigration, a very slow economy for the last 20 years, a traditional society that says women can have either children or a career but not both, and a reputation for a workaholic culture. People are just so busy spending their lives at work so they can keep their jobs that having a family comes second. This is a big reversal from the 1980s/1990s...I remember growing up hearing that Japan was taking over the world. MBA programs were toying with the idea of making Japanese language study a requirement if I remember correctly. This is similar to what China is doing now, but China has the population to sustain it in my opinion.

We in the US could be headed down this road too. Imagine if we close the borders and enter a period of economic stagnation. Couple this with the trend towards unstable employment, the gig economy, etc. Back in the 50s/60s, a man could count on being employed for life by a large US company and would take on the risk of a family, kids, house, car, etc. Now (IMO) we've let the pendulum swing too far back in favor of employers and removed any loyalty/stability either side had to the other. Hopefully people will realize that they want stability again once this Second Dotcom Bubble bursts and takes many of the sharing economy employers with it.

Re:The US may be headed this way too

[Xest]

The only reason it's even a problem is because most Western economies are built on the next generation funding the increasingly extravagant lifestyles of the last.

So when problems like this attempt to be tackled, by say, cutting the amount of free shit old people get (i.e. by removing free bus passes, and TV licenses as well as a couple of hundred quid free money for heating from millionaire pensioners) we get absurd arguments like "I paid for it", but given that there's no money to fund it that's evidence enough that they have not in fact paid for it.

Reduction in population is probably a good thing overall, it reduces pressure on the planet's resources, it reduces competition for wealth and resources reducing conflict, and it it generally just creates greater sustainability - we don't need to build as much, we don't need to harvest as much, and in an increasingly roboticised nation like Japan the loss of labour needn't be a problem.

But economies have to change to cater to shrinking populations, and that means older generations getting what they actually paid for, rather than expecting the next generation to pay for what they think the world owes them, which is politically difficult given that those generations are typically most likely to vote because when you're sat around with nothing to do all day you have ample time to do so.

Re:The US may be headed this way too

[Anonymous Coward]

we get absurd arguments like "I paid for it", but given that there's no money to fund it that's evidence enough that they have not in fact paid for it.

Not necessarily. Some times it's that the politicians use the money for other crap.

My grandfather had a retirement saving account. At some point the government realized that there were lots of money in those retirement savings accounts, so they socialized the pension system, moving all that money into the state budget. They then went on to spend the money, and instead used the money from the next generation to pay back the previous generation.

Now we also have shrinking generations (though not as much as Japan), and suddenly people have to have their own private retirement savings, because when the next generation is smaller than the previous, the government can't afford to pay back the money it already took.

Of course when they socialized the retirement savings, the payments became taxes, and now that we have to go back to private retirement savings, we are not getting those taxes back, because they still need to pay back the previous generation. So in reality we are paying twice.

Re:The US may be headed this way too

[strikethree]

The only reason it's even a problem is because most Western economies are built on the next generation funding the increasingly extravagant lifestyles of the last.

I am going to need you to define this because I am not understanding it. Are you saying that my parents are increasing the extravagance of their lifestyle at my expense or that I am increasing the extravagance of my lifestyle at my children's expense? Or both?

Or, are you just spewing garbage because your mind has been conditioned to believe certain fantasies?

So when problems like this attempt to be tackled, by say, cutting the amount of free shit old people get ...

So are you saying the my parents did not pay into Social Security or that I am not paying into Social Security or what? Neither myself, my parents, nor my children are receiving anything for free. There are no other generations alive right now so what you are saying should be applicable to one of those generations.

we get absurd arguments like "I paid for it", but given that there's no money to fund it that's evidence enough that they have not in fact paid for it.

Aha! You assume that missing money implies that something wasn't paid for. How cute. I am guessing you have never heard of fraud or theft or any of that. Think about it for a second: A person knows they paid for something. They receive that thing. The person providing that thing claims it was not paid for by the first part and must be paid for by the third party. Hm... Yep! The proper conclusion is that the first person never paid for it. Solid reasoning there buddy.

But economies have to change to cater to shrinking populations, and that means older generations getting what they actually paid for, rather than expecting the next generation to pay for what they think the world owes them, which is politically difficult given that those generations are typically most likely to vote because when you're sat around with nothing to do all day you have ample time to do so.

Blah Blah Blah Blah. Your words make no sense since they were founded upon ideas that are not true. Keep fighting the good fight my man. Don't let those elderly people rip you off.

Re:The US may be headed this way too

[drinkypoo]

Oh, so by your definition, America is overpopulated, too. Carry on.

We are not dependent on foreign oil. We are choosing to burn foreign oil for probably a number of geopolitical reasons, plus the usual kickbacks etc.

USA is provincial?

[Anonymous Coward]

You do realize Japan is quite xenophobic?

Re:This is good news.

[Anonymous Coward]

Americans don't think of these things as common courtesy - that was a generation or two ago.

While there's definitely some truth to this, a large part of it is also that Japanese tend to be much passive aggressive. So, the whole subway groping phenomenon is so pervasive that basically nothing is done about it. And those who want to raise awareness? They use kawai imagery because even anti-groping messages have to be cube.

The real issue with Americans is they're generally so very provincial. They tend not to have personally experienced foreign cultures and don't think much about multiple ways to do things. This is a major flaw because the whole American Melting Pot concept is based on conscious awareness, not mindless obedience from lack of other known options. Plenty of cultures other than the Japanese can highlight this, it's just that this one was on-topic.

Talk about pot calling the kettle black. Japan is massive provincial, xenophobic, sexist, and generally peaceful based upon a system of mindless obedience. The American Melting Pot concept is not base on conscious awareness as much as constant exposure which happens in cities but not most of rural America. This does not translate into wholly self-centeredness but there's definitely a lot more of it and more awareness of it in American tourists--consider how few Americans leave the country and see how much that creates a huge bias.

In any case, the Japanese crave cities like a lot of people crave cities: it's the best place to have a sustainable career with a substantial income. It's why the East/West coasts in the US have so many people. The main difference is that in the US the vast majority of the rest of the space is wide, open space. In Japan, it's mountains. It's little wonder a greater percentage might cluster around cities that have been heavily leveled/terraced. The other major point, of course, is having 125 million people in so small a space,
  regardless.

Re:Japan will do fine

[Anonymous Coward]

Yup. People act like a decreasing population is a disaster, but the reverse true. Put bluntly there are too many people on this planet. We can either reduce our population, as Japan is doing, or suffer the consequences (see India, Africa etc). Japan is living proof that this can be done in comfortably, despite the dire warnings from economists and politicians with an investment in the perpetual growth con.

Re:Testosterone levels

[alvinrod]

Oh for fucks sake, quit it with this nonsense. This whole "exploitation of the majority for the minority" fits any form of government. Do you think the common man lived any better under the various feudal systems that predate the modern capitalist economies? The same holds true for all of the communist systems that were tried as well, with huge disparities between the proles and the party leadership, with the only difference being that everyone was poorer. At least in western capitalist countries there's some form of social mobility where a poor immigrant like Andrew Carnegie can become wealthy and powerful. Medieval peasants didn't go around becoming lords unless they found a sword in stone.

People are having fewer children because we're so productive and good at keeping them alive, there isn't as much incentive to spawn half a dozen or more for extra farm labor. Household productivity is likewise vastly improved to the point where women can work part or full time outside of the house without the household falling into complete disarray so most of them don't want to sit around being a baby factory either. And its a good thing as well. The world doesn't need even more people when we haven't figured out how to make sure that the ones we have are all at a reasonable baseline and not committing various atrocities towards one and other.

We should learn from their example

[Subm]

The rest of the world could learn from their example and allow the earth's population to drop naturally.

Instead everyone falls back on knee-jerk beliefs that

- We need exponentially growing economies, which require exponentially growing populations, which are impossible to sustain on a finite planet

- Going to Mars will somehow alleviate overpopulation on Earth

- Populations are leveling off, which isn't related to the problem that we are over the planet's carrying capacity, drawing down and depleting resources

- Too few young people won't be able to support older ones, despite increases in productivity that allow 2% of the population to do what used to take 25%, to use the example of farming

- Lowering the population means eugenics or racism

- Human nature [insert opinion about human nature]

- Fusion or some other technology will save us (without population control it extends the overshoot leading to collapse)

- etc

All of the above beliefs are demonstrably wrong. There's no reason we can't allow the population to decrease without hurting anyone or any economy by simply having fewer children. Everyone would live in a world of more abundance per person. There would be as much culture as before and the species' chances of survival would increase.

The challenge is doing it. Step one is disabusing ourselves of the above beliefs.

Re:Testosterone levels

[drinkypoo]

Oh for fucks sake, quit it with this nonsense. This whole "exploitation of the majority for the minority" fits any form of government. Do you think the common man lived any better under the various feudal systems that predate the modern capitalist economies?

No, but that's no reason to "quit it" with what you call "this nonsense". The simple fact is that constant vigilance is the price of freedom precisely because human nature has not changed. Things are much better for the average person today than it was then, but the way we are living now (as a species) is unsustainable and is destroying our habitat. We can't just rest on our laurels because things are better today than they were during the dark ages.