Japan’s Worries of a Declining Birth Rate: Need for a Revamp

• Anoma van der Veere

  correspondent Japan

“The country is on the verge of collapse,” Japanese Prime Minister Kishida told a group of politicians early this year. “It is now or never.” The number of children born in Japan has fallen below 800,000 a year, a record low. The death rate is almost double at 1.58 million, an unsustainable situation according to the prime minister.

The fact that the birth rate is so much lower than the death rate has all kinds of negative consequences. Due to the aging population, the pressure on health care and the pension system is increasing.

Kishida has now promised to change course after years of failed policies. The cabinet is about to announce new measures, including subsidies for parents and forced parental leave. However, it does not seem to solve the biggest problem: that Japanese young people cannot afford children, or simply do not want them.

“The low birth rate is due to so many different factors,” said Professor Takashi Ishii, a population expert at Aoyama Gakuin University. “If we list them, there is no end to it. But the biggest factor is that young people are earning less and less, while raising children has become more expensive.”

Purchasing power in Japan has fallen sharply in the last thirty years. As a result, more women went to work, resulting in fewer children being born.

When Prime Minister Kishida therefore proposed that women should be retrained during their leave so that they can return to work more quickly after pregnancy, he was publicly ridiculed. In Japan, women bear the brunt of child rearing and household chores, and they also rank first in terms of job insecurity.

Kishida’s proposal thus symbolizes national policy, which focuses more often on combating symptoms than on core problems. “The population is shrinking too fast, our systems can no longer cope,” says Ishii. “It has to be completely overhauled.”

Now the government is considering doubling the budget for childcare. But on top of existing problems, the country is struggling with rising house prices, stagnant wages and high inflation. So the new policy is like having an eel by the tail: “It’s not just a money problem, it’s a structural problem. You have to find a comprehensive solution that the whole society can support. There isn’t one now,” according to Ishii.

A small village, hidden among the mountains of Japan, hopes to have found the solution. “Raising children should be more fun, parents should be able to do it with a smile,” said Nagi Mayor Masachika Oku. “Just giving financial support is not enough, you have to remove all barriers.”

Nagi has a remarkable birth rate of 2.95 per couple, against the national average of 1.3. For years, local policymakers have been experimenting with various programs and subsidies to encourage parents to have more children.

“Mums and dads can participate in parenting courses for 80 euro cents per year and we have flexible childcare for 2 euros per hour,” says Hiroko Kaihara, manager of the local parenting center. The whole community is involved in the upbringing, for example retired fellow villagers are asked to watch out at the shelter. “I hear more and more from parents that it is easy to have a second, third or even fourth child here,” says Kaihara.

Not only the care for young children is supported. “We help the parents find flexible work and suitable homes. Education costs half of the normal school fees for your second child and it is free from your third child,” says Moriyasu Eiji, policy officer in Nagi.

“The problem with Nagi is that it’s a small community,” says Ishii. “It’s hard to estimate whether it would work in big cities like Tokyo and Osaka.” In Japan, the birth rate is lowest in the cities and much higher in the countryside. In recent years, however, these figures have leveled off, as young people are flocking to the cities in search of education and work.

“It is a national problem. Soon we will no longer be able to keep our hospitals and supermarkets open, and even the bus will no longer be able to drive,” says Oku. “I don’t know if our model can be applied on a large scale, but if you start small it should be possible.” “It’s worth a try,” adds Eiji.