Without Babies, Can Japan Survive?

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/16/opinion/sunday/without-babies-can-japan-survive.html?ref=opinion

by llambda • 14 years ago

44 81 14 years ago

ajross2• 14 years ago

This is pretty awful analysis. It conflates aggregate statistics (e.g. GDP) with per-capita ones (birth rates, cost per child). And it's headline is a clear lie designed to draw clicks.

Demographic change is a real challenge, and all industrial societies are heading for that kind of cliff. Japan's is larger than most (but smaller than China's), and they are going to get there first. But this isn't the kind of disaster being posited. It means, broadly, that for a generation or so society will be burdened by a disproportionately large elderly population, and caring for them will require resources that we'd prefer to spend on other things. But eventually things will return to a steady state, just with fewer people. We'll manage.

JoeAltmaier2• 14 years ago

Birthrate is 1.39 per woman. No, that will not reach a steady state. That's a constant decline.

lotsofpulp• 14 years ago

If I recall correctly, ~2.3 children per woman is the replacement rate, i.e. keeps population steady. Of course, changes in longevity / infant mortality may have changed that statistic.

Edit: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Total_fertility_rate#Replacemen...

According to Wikipedia's source, replacement rate is ~2.1 for developed nations, so I would guess Japan is definitely not at a replacement rate at 1.4. Of course, replacement rates are just to keep population steady, but I would think a country with too many old people is still somewhat of a problem, unless you could figure out how to take care of them and/or make them productive.

eriksank2• 14 years ago

Well, the problem won't be for just one generation. If the birthrate remains the same, the same problem will repeat itself generation after generation. One child per woman means: 32 - 16 - 8 - 4 - 2 - 1. Furthermore, it seems no problem to cut the birthrate, but virtually impossible to push it up again.

ajross2• 14 years ago

True, but not of the form we're seeing (e.g. the base for the exponent surely isn't 2!). (It also bears mentioning that other factors like increases in working lifetime and overall lifetime counteract the birthrate decreases). Right now we're seeing a "cliff" due to a change in the birthrate due to the very rapid change to an industrialized urban economy. That won't repeat.

tomjen34• 14 years ago

Virtually impossible?

Hardly. One generation where the average is 10 children per woman will boost the economy and permanently change the demographics; it may sound completely unrealistic, but it was the norm only a few generations ago.

And no, it didn't end when a lot of the children stopped dying in childbirth, as my grandfather had something like 8 brothers, and all of them made it into adulthood just fine.

mistercow• 14 years ago

Yes, there are some statistical flaws in the article, but the general point that Japan's population aging and that this is a problem is true.

You say that things will return to a steady state, but why do you believe that?

w1ntermute3• 14 years ago

It also depends on culture. The article says that Japanese women don't find Japanese men as attractive partners because of low pay, long working hours for them, etc., but there's also the fact that young Japanese men just aren't that interested in having sex or pursuing women. This cultural phenomenon, known as Sōshoku danshi （草食男子）, or herbivorous men[0,1], has to end if things are going to turn around. These men are more interested in their hobbies and personal grooming. This image summarizes the problem well: http://i.imgur.com/SUVEp.jpg

In fact, it's often the opposite of what the article states - there's a trend among women called Nikushoku joshi （肉食女子）, or carnivorous women, where the women are actively pursuing men out of necessity.

0: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herbivore_men

1: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/10...

nacker• 14 years ago

The cultural changes you mention are not specific to Japan, they are global. For an in depth analysis of the issue I suggest F. Roger Devlin's classic paper 'Sexual Utopia In Power':

http://dontmarry.files.wordpress.com/2009/03/sexualutopia.pd...

greggman• 14 years ago

I watched a Japanese program where the government claimed in the year 3000 the population of Japan would be ....

7 people.

Obviously I don't think it would actually get there but that is the current rate if nothing else changes (or rate at the time the program was aired)

The segment ended with a tongue in cheek admonition to make a baby tonight for Japan :)

Retric• 14 years ago

The problem with extrapolating like this is it's assuming many things are constant like birth rate which are not necessarily the case.

If you compare the birth and death rates they have only recently crossed, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Bdrates_of_Japan_since_195... which means the value of land is increasing as more people compete for the same resources.

For example, as the population starts to decline housing will become cheaper which will reduce commuting times and debt. Which will make it much easier to start a family and should increase the birth rate. It also dramatically reduces the need for new infrastructure.

seunosewa• 14 years ago

I think immigration is the best solution. There's no shortage of babies and young people in the world. The article notes that liberal immigration policies are not popular. Well, maybe that's the problem. I suspect that immigration will gain popularity when the problems caused by the ageing population become sufficiently severe. The problem will solve itself at the right time.

zdw• 14 years ago

Japan has always been very insular and has very strong anti-immigration policies.

Also, their politics is probably more screwed up and dysfunctional than this article suggests, so any change seems unlikely.

captaintacos2• 14 years ago

Immigration "would be" the best solution but we are talking about Japan in here. Not an "immigrant friendly" country like Canada, Australia or the US. Simply put... Japan is "allergic" to foreigners.

Surprisingly the process to get a work/student visa in Japan is much more easier than in Australia or the US (I've applied to one or another in all these countries and it's such a breeze to do in Japan).

Despite that, immigration remains low. For the foreigners here, last time I checked it was basically composed of about 80% of foreigners from China, 15% from Korea and the remaining 5% from the rest of the world.

I suppose the difficulty of the language and geographic location has something to do. Racism as known in the West is rare, but the truth is, Japan has consistently failed to assimilate any foreign population and it is really difficult to explain how it is like. I guess it's definitely more like a Canadian "cultural mosaic" more than an American "melting pot". But the cultural mosaic has some sense of equilibrium. For the case of Japan it would look more like "patching the kimono with pieces of fabrics of different patterns".

The thing is, under the hood, legally speaking, Japan is very open and welcoming to foreigners, but it fails to keep them in or assimilate them.

kfk• 14 years ago

Hi, when you say "open", you mean also for workers? Do you have any potential advice for somebody looking for a job over there?

w1ntermute3• 14 years ago

The Japanese are quite xenophobic and consider immigration to be a last resort. For this reason, they have invested (and continue to invest) large sums of money into robotics research, in an attempt to replace their working population without allowing mass immigration.

powertower• 14 years ago

That might be the best solution to maintaining head-counts in a more immediate manner.

But it gets a bit more complicated.

How would you solve the issue of no-go zones, crime and violence, incompatibility and intolerance, and lack of unity?

Because those are all the things that increase in a non-marginal way when you mass immigrate a society and start replacing its identity, culture, and people with another.

Would you build more prisons? Would you make excuses for the new people? What would you do exactly when that same society starts breaking apart?

lucian3032• 14 years ago

This is the opposite of a problem. Wether intentionally or not, Japan is showing the world the only way the whole _world_ can survive: by having less babies. To expect growth at a time of such overpopulation is cruel and hurtful to the entire human population.

altcognito3• 14 years ago

No, as others have pointed out in the thread, you need 2.1-2.3 to reach replacement of population. In general, the planet can "easily" support the number of people we have. While I don't think there would be serious harm in a happy, voluntary reduction in the overall population, this isn't a sustainable long term (100's of years) trend. While I would like to think we're going to return to replacement levels of child bearing, I don't see any evidence or reason that it would just yet.

lucian3032• 14 years ago

Why? Out of the author's solutions that have been discussed in Japan for decades, only one involves children (and that's related to daycare, not more babies), and the others involve changing a culture that needs to change to adapt to this. Then they would be an example to the world.

If the planet cannot "easily" support the number of people we have now, please prove how. Because right now it isn't.

hudibras3• 14 years ago

At the current birthrate/deathrate, Japan's population will be 60 million by 2100. That's the same population as in the 1920s. So the same population but with almost 180 years of technologic and productivity advances? I think most people would like that.

Tokyo literally employees people to shove commuters into rush-hour trains. Who wouldn't want to live in a Tokyo with the same infrastructure but with 40% fewer people using it? Sounds pretty good to me.

Nux• 14 years ago

It's almost incredible to have this kind of problem today when the global population is growing uncontrollably.

AndrewDucker• 14 years ago

Except the global population isn't growing uncontrollably.

The USA has a birth rate just barely above replenishment (and dropping), Europe has dropped below replenishment rate, etc.

Some pretty graphs here: http://andrewducker.dreamwidth.org/2776214.html

k_kelly• 14 years ago

I think the real concern with this is not that we’ll have fewer people in Japan (a good thing) but that the system can’t support contraction.

If you have a workforce in their thirties who are still at entry level positions or thereabouts, and a majority of voters between the age of 50 and 80, you end up with a political class that wins elections with pro-retirement and healthcare policies and a tax-base that has no way to pay for it. This is a recipe for disaster and it’s already happening in Japan. It could easily happen in any aging population.

rayiner• 14 years ago

It's not. Current projections are that global population will peak under 10 billion then start declining. China is going to peak in 2026 then start shrinking. Overpopulation is a solved problem for now. The big problem is that now all those people want to live like Americans.

btilly5• 14 years ago

These demographic trends are, unfortunately, only temporary.

From the point of view of evolution, birth control is a disaster. I have done exactly the activity evolution has programmed me to do to continue the species, regularly, for over 20 years. Only twice did it result in children, and both times were conscious choices on my part.

However evolution knows how to face these disasters. There is a small minority of people who have the option of birth control, who have all of the same economic incentives that I do, yet choose to have lots of children. Their children are less likely to want to use birth control than mine. Thanks to exponential growth, that minority that chooses to have children regardless will become a majority. And after that point, voluntary birth control and economic incentives will not suffice to keep the population from growing.

This is literally evolution in action.

zeteo2• 14 years ago

You said it, brother (sister?). In each country there are subcultures (religious fundamentalists, usually) that have birth rates well above replacement. Secular culture has managed to peel away many of their kids in recent decades but, with the kind of uninspiring, plasticky productions currently streaming out of Hollywood / big label music, that process is about to change. Let's just say, your radio is likely to play a lot more Christian rock in your old age.

wilfra2• 14 years ago

I'd say it's a lot more likely to be playing Mariachi than Christian rock...

yummyfajitas5• 14 years ago

It isn't just religious fundamentalists - it's also people with low conscientiousness. They have no moral aversion to birth control, they just don't think too hard about the consequences of unprotected sex (it feels nicer, and condoms are at the drugstore three blocks away).

And while Mormon's rapid breeding might prevent demographic malaise, the rapid breeding of low conscientiousness people won't - the very trait that causes them to breed rapidly also causes them to be generally unproductive.

greenyoda5• 14 years ago

It's not really evolution, strictly speaking, unless you believe that the choice to avoid using birth control is somehow determined by a person's genes.

JoeAltmaier2• 14 years ago

Cultural evolution? Cultures certainly behave like organisms. A culture of birth control could easily get out of hand and exterminate the group the espoused it. E.g. Shakers.

btilly5• 14 years ago

Weaker than that. Not determined, but just affected.

As a random example it is known that genes play a big role in causing ADHD, which is associated with a variety of risky behaviors, which might conceivably be correlated with increased reproduction rates.

If ADHD people has kids 10% faster than the rest of the population, then in something 30 generations, we'd expect over half the population to have ADHD. That's about 750 years. (I do not know if this is the case with ADHD. I'm throwing it out as a random example. For all I know there is no real difference. Or, in the presence of birth control, a 20% difference.)

It isn't just ADHD, though. Every possible genetically determined characteristic that limits how effectively birth control prevents you from having children is now being aggressively selected for. All else remaining equal, in a few hundred years we are likely to see significant behavior shifts in our species.

mattmaroon• 14 years ago

I believe the article is incorrect about one thing. Japan has a formal army. It's constitution forbids it from declaring war, but it still has quite a large military for self defense. Though, like about half the article, that is apropos of nothing.

known• 14 years ago

Japanese society strictly follows https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ingroups_and_outgroups

RyanZAG4• 14 years ago

Feels like the article misses the obvious while actually stating it. The reason for Japan's declining birth rate:

"Although Japanese couples consistently say in surveys that they would like to have more than two children, they don’t. Part of the problem is Japan’s prolonged economic malaise. Years of stagnant (or declining) incomes have made Japanese men less attractive as potential partners. And economic uncertainty has led couples to delay getting married and having children. The shortage of public day care centers, especially in cities, has made the cost and burden of parenthood so high that today’s couples either have fewer babies or none at all. (Japan’s birthrate is just 1.39 children per woman.)"

What happens when the population shrinks as a result of this? All of these problems magically right themselves.

Shortage of public day care centers? Solved with lower population.

Stagnant or declining incomes? Solved with a lower population, as each person can command a greater share of the economy (in aggregate) from simple supply/demand of labor.

This is just a pendulum swinging back into equilibrium that will eventually be felt across the globe - and while worse for Japan's Gross GDP, it will improve Japan's GDP per Capita, the only truly important 'country level' measure for actual citizens.

meric• 14 years ago

That works, but only as long as the proportion of non-productive population does not increase too fast.

halviti• 14 years ago

You're only focusing on one side of the argument.

Less young people means a small amount of young people paying for lots of older people, which is a large financial burden on the people able to work. (as well as many other factors)

Also, GDP per capita is only used to measure money. There are many other factors that people might find important like happiness rankings, which to me happiness can be much more important than money.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gross_national_happiness

philwelch3• 14 years ago

GDP per capita doesn't go up when population goes down, because there are fewer people working to produce goods and services. There's no economy genie producing wealth that has to be divided among the population.

dasil003• 14 years ago

It does if everything is made in highly automated factories and you have a lot of unemployed.

RyanZAG4• 14 years ago

A large portion of country wealth is often tied up in land and infrastructure. Wealth generally creates more wealth (through interest and similar), so the same wealth spread across a smaller number of people will push GDP per capita upwards.

Higher incomes are also closely associated with better education. If you keep the number of universities and schools constant while decreasing the population, you give a larger percentage of the population access to better education.

If a family has two children, the wealth of the family must be divided between both children and each child has less individual wealth. As you need wealth to start a business, a higher base wealth across the population means more chance of new successful businesses being started by these children.

If a family has no children, the estate will move into public control, effectively increasing GDP per capita for the surviving population.

A reason for a low birthrate in Japan is lack of financial security. This means that people who have low wealth are self-selecting out of reproduction, effectively moving their wealth into public ownership when they pass away and moving the average up as the proportion of low wealth to high wealth families is shifted.

So yes, practically, GDP per capita will go up in Japan as the population shrinks. The global economy is more complex than just 'producing shiny widgets', or China would be far more well off than it is. Capitalism in action.

EDIT: As pointed out by others correctly, increased welfare burdens from too large a proportion of retired citizens will have an effect. This can swing two ways: increased taxes, or reduced welfare payments.

If reduced welfare payments is chosen, it will cancel out the problem. Japan will hopefully choose this route out of self preservation.

If increased taxes is chosen, it will effectively tunnel income into the housing sector (old age homes, etc) and medical sector (medicine, life support, etc). The housing sector increase will be offset by a smaller housing demand from lower population. The medical sector is the big issue: if this wealth can be tunneled into Japanese medicine and health care, then it will simply be a transfer from taxpayers to Japanese in the medical sector. This would probably cause all kinds of distortions and should be avoided. However, it's not guaranteed to be a bad thing, I think anyway. You'll just have more Japanese going to medical school.

tomjen34• 14 years ago

Shortage of daycare centers may sort it self out before the economy gets completely screwed up, but soon after the declining production (due to less workers) will mean less taxincome for the government, which always means that school, daycare, the elderly and hospitals will be cut.

Workers might have been able to command a much higher salary a century or two ago, but in global world there is only so high the salary of an individual can go before the entire thing comes crashing down into a gigantic economic disaster.

Regarding gigantic economical disasters, consider what will happen when the current generations retire. Unless the government has put enough aside to pay for the retirement of all these people (very doubtful), then it must get whatever it can from the citizens who are working -- and with a very small amount of people working, that means that each worker will have to pay a lot more in taxes, which is not likely to lead to either economic prosperity or reelection of the politicians (even though their hands will be completely tied down).

maratd5• 14 years ago

This is wrong on a profound level. GDP is Gross Domestic Product. In other words, all the goods and services produced. The price level and quantity are deeply tied to demand and for most goods/services, demand is tied to the population. More people means more goods/services sold at a higher quantity and price. Economic growth is largely population growth. The Japanese economic stagnation is largely caused by their population stagnation and will certainly not be fixed by it.

yummyfajitas5• 14 years ago

More people means more goods/services sold at a higher quantity and price.

Can you explain why more people causes price to go up?

Quantity will certainly go up, but only in proportion to population, thus having no net effect on GDP per capita.

greenyoda5• 14 years ago

Another reason why shrinking population won't magically solve Japan's problems is that they'll have smaller and smaller numbers of working-age people supporting larger and larger numbers of retirees, leaving the younger people even less money to spend on themselves and their children.

This is the same problem that's looming for the Social Security system in the U.S., and probably in most developed countries, as average lifespans increase. (A much smaller percentage of people actually lived to retirement age when the Social Security system was first created.) But this problem will hit Japan first due to their low birth rate.

guard-of-terra2• 14 years ago

I've modelled a society with 1.0 birth rate and everyone died. And it's not like died in a million years; no, the last "person" was born something like 150 years from the start.

Having said that, why would anyone live in the remote countryside? In a rural town? We can't bring modern standards of entertainment and culture to the countryside. Museums, clubs with modern live music, theatres, circuses - you can't have that and that's what make you a modern person.

I guess most people will be living in fifty kilometer radius from a million plus population hub. That's what we should have.

tomjen34• 14 years ago

Please don't make the mistake of assuming that any kind of growth is constant -- people respond to incentives and if the price of having a child goes up, people naturally respond by having fewer children. And yes, the price of child is the highest it has even been.

Just to satisfy my curiousity, how many people were in your society to begin with? At what age did they reproduce? Was the reproduction constant or did it change between couples?

guard-of-terra2• 14 years ago

Of course society can heal, 'm just saying it's possible to get a badly incentivized society to crash itself and it won't be easy to fix the setup given the negative momentum.

10000. They reproduced between 25 and 35. You could tune the birth rate but it was constant for the simulation. People lived for 80 years. This kind of setup gave you a temporary boost and then a surprisingly hard landing.

watt• 14 years ago

Japan is overpopulated as it is. I fail to see anything wrong with population levels dropping, to some lower, sustainable levels.

The low birthrate is caused by overpopulation: there's too little resources to give to babies, so it's impossible to have children. I would actually say, there's so little to go around, people can't form families (get a partner, be a couple - maybe because the courting ritual is too elaborate now), so less people are even able to have a go at having a child.

squonk• 14 years ago

How much of Japan's population syndrome is directly assignable to Japan's unique policies, versus the nature of first world countries in general?

Japan's population has been essentially flat for the last 6 years: 127,773,000 in 2005, 127,817,000 in 2011. It is headed south as long as the birth rate remains so low. So no question that the rest of the world needs to understand the effects of negative population growth. A decreasing population will test many economic policies that relied on monotonically increasing population to be effective. I doubt we can predict all of the policies that will break.

Without Babies, Can Japan Survive?

Related Stories