Life in a Shrinking Japan (japantimes.co.jp)
- Reference: 0180485345
- News link: https://news.slashdot.org/story/25/12/30/0716215/life-in-a-shrinking-japan
- Source link: https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2025/12/29/japan/society/japan-2050-predections-depopulation/
The share of residents aged 65 and over stood at 29.4% as of September and is expected to reach 37.1% by midcentury. The dependency ratio -- children and older adults supported by every 100 working-age people -- is projected to rise from 68.0 to 89.0, meaning each working-age person will effectively support one dependent.
Akita Prefecture is currently offering a preview of this future. Its population fell 1.93% year over year as of November 1, the steepest decline of any prefecture, and more than 40% of its residents are already 65 or older. By 2050, Akita's population is projected to drop to around 560,000, roughly 60% of its current size. Japan's total fertility rate fell for the ninth consecutive year in 2024, declining to 1.15 from 1.2. A health ministry survey found around 319,000 babies were born in the first half of 2025, more than 10,000 fewer than the same period last year -- a pace that could put the full-year total at a record low.
[1] https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2025/12/29/japan/society/japan-2050-predections-depopulation/
Re:Keep voting.... (Score:5, Insightful)
It's not inflation or housing costs causing birthrates to decline.
Housing in places like Akita Prefecture where birthrates are falling the fastest is super cheap. In rural areas, they will literally give you a free house. Japan as a whole has mostly experienced deflation over the last 30 years.
Re: (Score:1)
Cheap now that there are no people or jobs, doubt it started out that way.
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Any welfare state? The places with the highest birthrates have no welfare state to speak of. The facts simply don't conform to your ideologically driven preconceived notions.
The highest birthrates in the world are in countries like Chad and the Central African Republic (some of the poorest countries in the world). The people living in those countries receive no welfare or government support because their governments are not wealthy enough to provide welfare programs even if they wanted to. The most generous
Re: Keep voting.... (Score:2)
Every woman has 5+ children who all don't want to be there. That's why they migrate to other better countries. Tired of people bringing up this fact every time someone says children cost money
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Once again, the facts do not support this narrative.
The vast majority of children born in impoverished countries do not actually migrate to other countries. Most continue to live where in the country or at least region where they were born. That's why the population of sub-Saharan Africa is growing quickly but the population of Europe and the United States is not. Even in countries that have seen mass population decline from migration (Venezuela), the vast majority of migrants have gone elsewhere in Latin A
There's no jobs (Score:2, Interesting)
The reason why those rural areas have cheap housing is there is no jobs. I can go buy a house in Detroit right now for 10 grand in a place with no jobs.
We make jobs a resource necessary to live. Jobs are as important as food and water because they are the thing that comes before getting the food and the water.
Japan like everywhere else is automating the shit out of everything. Automation is devouring jobs much faster than we can create new ones.
There is no solution to that problem besides social
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But places with socialism and abundant jobs still have low birthrates. You can debate the optimal economic system until you are blue in the face, but it's not the reason birthrates are low.
I have a solution! (Score:2)
Just make each person in Japan a billionaire! We all know Elon Musk (14+ kids) but you may not have heard about Pavel Durov (reportedly 100+ via donations), and Chinese businessman Xu Bo, who is actively having dozens of children via surrogacy for succession, Farris Wilks, Steven Spielberg, and Steve Cohen also have many kids (7+), often using surrogacy or multiple partners to build their families and legacies. Billionaire's exceed the 2.1 birthrate break even threshold in every country but China and here
Honestly a pretty noble exercise. (Score:2)
I suspect that parts of the transition will not go smoothly, especially for the people who end up winging it without the opportunity to observe prior cases; but the widespread recognition that, frankly, what we do mostly isn't worth it and absolutely isn't worth dooming endless batches of fresh meat to seems like a noble change from millennia of throwing fresh meat at problems that only remain problems because you keep throwing fresh meat at them.
There are all sorts of purposes that will loudly proclaim
Will they print money? (Score:1)
"each working-age person will effectively support one dependent."
How much work does it take to press keys to create money? If the quantity theory is correct, why isn't Japan already a hyperinflationary failed state with its 230% debt-to-GDP ratio?
Re:Will they print money? (Score:4, Insightful)
There are a few reasons for this.
1) Japan does not maintain a large military. They rely primarily on the US for protection.
2) Japan's system of government is highly socialist. This allows the demographics to more easily adapt.
3) People in Japan are not as materialistic as what we are used to in the US. SImply put, they don't need as much shit to be happy.
4) They have deflation, which keeps people happy regardless of macroeconomic foibles.
5) Japanese people are much more willing to live with multiple generations under a single roof.
Japan is not socialist (Score:3)
Japan's government itself is not socialist. They have a corporatist economy, most prominently featured by Keiretsus. The other things you mentioned are true, and people there do live in a way that Americans aren't used to - like the multiple generations under one roof. But the government - you have an emperor, who's now a titular monarch, and an elected government, which may sometimes be Center-Left, sometimes Center-Right.
Also, on the military, Japan has not only been spending more, but they've also b
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They've been printing money for like the last 30 years. The way they've been doing it is via having negative effective interest rates. Its already so ingrained in the global financial system that it caused a problem called the "yen carry trade unwind" when they tried to turn it off.
Re: Will they print money? (Score:1)
easy - the quantity theory of money is wrong.