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Record low number of babies born in Japan

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Dram

Member
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/world_now/2012/08/japan-population-low-birthrate.html

Fewer babies were born in Japan in the last year than any other on record, pulling down its population for the third year in a row, according to government statistics released this week.

As of the end of March, Japan had more than 260,000 fewer people than a year earlier, the biggest drop of the Japanese population yet, according to Japanese media.

The baby bust has continued year after year despite Japanese efforts to nudge up the numbers: The government has doled out payments for couples with children and subsidized daycare. Japanese towns publicly herald the number of local births in city signs. Engineering students even crafted a cooing robotic baby years ago in hope of setting biological clocks ticking.

Taking a more pointed tack, one professor recently created an online clock that ominously counts down until Japan has no children left -- a doomsday estimated to roll around in 3012.

The Japanese are well aware of the problem, but birthrates continue to hover under 1.4 children per woman, far below the 2.1 needed to replace one generation with the next, said Noriko Tsuya, a Keio University statistician who leads a government committee on population. The number of marriage has dropped, and bearing children out of wedlock is rare, Tsuya said.

Experts say women forced to choose between child and career in Japanese companies have increasingly opted against babies. Despite government efforts to foster gender equality, Japanese women are still expected to shoulder chores at home, researchers have repeatedly noted. Some companies pressure Japanese women to leave if they marry or have a baby, said John W. Traphagan, a University of Texas at Austin professor who has studied family dynamics in Japan.

Men seem to be losing interest in babymaking in the first place, with one government survey finding that more than a third of Japanese males ages 16 to 19 were uninterested in sex or even despised it; even more women said the same. The erosion of old guarantees of lifetime employment and the rise of temporary jobs are also damping the desire to start families.

The rapid graying of Japan imperils its social security system and could stunt its economy. So far, the country has whittled down social security benefits and raised taxes, but the pressure continues to mount as Japan grows older, said Robert Clark, an economics professor at North Carolina State University. The growing number of elderly suffering dementia and Alzheimer’s disease are also expected to put new pressure on institutions and families.

“The government is trying very hard but it’s very difficult to reverse this downward spiral of fertility,” Tsuya said. “What can you do? You’re not going to kill the healthy elderly. You’re not going to force people to have more kids. You could bring in people from the outside, but Japan is not a country that brings in a lot of people from outside.”

Other countries with low birthrates have made up for their losses by welcoming immigrants, but Japan has been reluctant to do so. The big question, Traphagan said, is whether the shrinking population will push Japan to overcome that reluctance.
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Acerac

Acerac

Banned
At this rate the country will lack children in only A THOUSAND YEARS?!?!

The world remains sorely underpopulated due to countries like Japan and it'll only get worse if they're allowed to continue. There needs to be a forced breeding regimen in place to counter this horrific loss of human population.
 
P

Platy

Member
So, this means that in a close future people will have more space for their hotel rooms in japan ?

BMu9S.jpg
 
M

metalslimer

Member
Other countries with low birthrates have made up for their losses by welcoming immigrants, but Japan has been reluctant to do so.
Click to expand...

Well there's not much you can do when the country is so resistant. Also what the fuck at people 16-19 being turned off to sex. What is going on over there? I thought the whole Love Plus and other simulators thing killing off relationships was just a joke...
 
S

smurfx

get some go again
a declining population would maybe mean lower prices for homes and maybe they could have more babies then but that aging population is gonna wreck them.
 
K

KillGore

Member
Excuse my ignorance but what's the problem with having low number of births? It's not like the Japanese people will cease to exist. I know that in the US the younger generations pays social security for the older generations that are retired but is it the same in Japan or something?
 
M

Makoto

Member
Ghost_Protocol said:
Maybe they should do something about the ridiculous amount of perverse material marketed to their 16-19 year old population.
Click to expand...
Oh man, where's that picture/video of the guy who said anime girls were clean while real life girls were not? Not that I'm saying anime is responsible for the birth rate decline but the quoted post just reminded me of that picture/video.
 
C

Charles Foster Kane

Rosebud
I don`t know, but I see the decreasing population of Japan as a good thing.

In a world with an ever growing population, where supplies will diminish as time progresses a country balancing or even dimishing it`s population is a good thing, maybe not economically or short term, but it will pay off in the future. It`s not like it`s going to diminish completely anyays.

I know India would be super happy if this happened in their country.
 
Phoenix

Phoenix

Member
KillGore said:
Excuse my ignorance but what's the problem with having low number of births? It's not like the Japanese people will cease to exist. I know that in the US the younger generations pays social security for the older generations that are retired but is it the same in Japan or something?
Click to expand...

It is a critical issue. If you consider every child an "at bat" for producing something that benefits society, provides a new leader, etc. when you get down to so few opportunities - you are a dying population that will eventually become irrelevant on the world stage.
 
C

CrocMother

Banned
Charles Foster Kane said:
I don`t know, but I see the decreasing population of Japan as a good thing.

In a world with an ever growing population, where supplies will diminish as time progresses a country balancing or even dimishing it`s population is a good thing, maybe not economically or short term, but it will pay off in the future. It`s not like it`s going to diminish completely anyays.

I know India would be super happy if this happened in their country.
Click to expand...

Ideally you want 2.1% population growth, which is right where the US is (but only due to immigration). There are a lot of economic variables to factor in, and each country has unique problems.

In general, having a larger % of your population in retirement than working (and paying taxes) is an economic nightmare, and when you combine that with growing life expectancy it does become a long term problem.

image29.png


This is very bad.

pyramid-US-Obama.gif


US by comparison
 
K

Kyuuketsu_Night

Member
I don't think they're trying at all and it's still really expensive to have a baby in Japan. Things are a bit more complicated than funds of course.

A lot of people I know are working 10-12 hour days for no reason.

They come home to eat their konbini food, sleep, then start over again without a vacation.
 
M

milanbaros

Member?
It's very interesting watching what is happening to Japan. I don't think it has ever happened before. There are countries following their patten e.g. South Korea, but they are behind by a good 10-15 years.
 
K

KillGore

Member
Machado said:
maybe you're thinking "the less the better since there will be more for the rest of us" but in reality it doesn't work that ay.

Less people means less opportunities of investment, less money flow less GBP growth and so on and so forth
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Interesting but that's not always the case, right? I mean we have countries like Norway, Sweden and Finland who are doing amazing and have less than 10 million people each.

Also, wouldn't an increasing population affect the country eventually? It seems like it's a ticking time bomb. Wouldn't it be better to have an oscillating population where it grows, decreases and increases again?
 
M

Master Thespian

Member
Dram said:
Men seem to be losing interest in babymaking in the first place, with one government survey finding that more than a third of Japanese males ages 16 to 19 were uninterested in sex or even despised it; even more women said the same.
Click to expand...
If I thought the girl was gonna cry the whole time like they do in Japorn I wouldn't want to either.
 
E

Ether_Snake

安安安安安安安安安安安安安安安
Development of a cure for immortality to be funded by the Japanese government like the USA funded the mission to go to the moon, confirmed!

I give it 10 years.
 
C

Charles Foster Kane

Rosebud
CrocMother said:
Ideally you want 2.1% population growth, which is right where the US is (but only due to immigration). There are a lot of economic variables to factor in, and each country has unique problems.

In general, having a larger % of your population in retirement than working (and paying taxes) is an economic nightmare, and when you combine that with growing life expectancy it does become a long term problem.

image29.png


This is very bad.

pyramid-US-Obama.gif


US by comparison
Click to expand...

I understand, but taking the economic factor out, isn`t depopulation a good thing? Overpopulation will be the biggest problem in the world if the growth continues. I think I read somewhere that there were just over 2 billion people in the world in the 40s, now there more than 7. Imagine how it will be in the 2050s. I don`t care about the economics, I care about the world. It don`t know if it can sustain more than 15 billion people :p
 
C

CrocMother

Banned
milanbaros said:
It's very interesting watching what is happening to Japan. I don't think it has ever happened before. There are countries following their patten e.g. South Korea, but they are behind by a good 10-15 years.
Click to expand...

Eastern Europe is actually where it is worst overall


Charles Foster Kane said:
I understand, but taking the economic factor out, isn`t depopulation a good thing? Overpopulation will be the biggest problem in the world if the growth continues. I think I read somewhere that there were just over 2 billion people in the world in the 40s, now there more than 7. Imagine how it will be in the 2050s. I don`t care about the economics, I care about the world. It don`t know if it can sustain more than 15 billion people :p
Click to expand...

A world where the elderly outnumber the young isn't a healthy world any way you spin it. The biggest problem isn't overpopulation it is sustainability. The world can handle a few billion more people, we just have to learn to change our living habits and reverse environmental degradation.
 
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