CNN reports that "Japan’s population fell by 800,000 last year as demographic crisis accelerates." The article indicates that at the beginning of 2023, Japan's population stood at 125.4 million including both Japanese and gaijin (foreigners). And while the number of foreigners rose by 289,500 compared to the prior year--an increase of more than 10%--"the number of Japanese residents shrank by 800,523, marking the 14th consecutive year of contraction since a peak in 2009, said the ministry." The article also indicates that "for the first time, all prefectures across the country saw a decrease in the number of Japanese nationals, a ministry spokesperson told CNN," although Tokyo saw its population increase slightly due to the influx of foreigners.
The article continues:
The number of deaths last year also hit another record high, with 1.56 million recorded – compared to less than half the number of births recorded, just 771,801 newborns, according to the ministry.
Deaths have outpaced births in Japan for more than a decade, posing a growing problem for leaders of the world’s third-largest economy. They now face a ballooning elderly population, along with a shrinking workforce to fund pensions and health care as demand from the aging population surges.
Japan’s population has been in steady decline since its economic boom of the 1980s, with a fertility rate of 1.3 – far below the rate of 2.1 required to maintain a stable population, in the absence of immigration.
Much of the rest of the article is about how Japan needs more foreign workers and immigrants, concluding:
A report last year by a Tokyo-based research organization found that Japan needs about four times as many foreign workers than 2020 levels by 2040 to achieve the government’s economic goals. But, it warned, to do that Japan must first create an environment that supports the human rights of migrant workers, and push for social change to be more accepting of foreigners.
In other words, Japan must cease to be Japanese in order to survive.
Or it can be comfy with a smaller population.
ReplyDeleteWhat has the powers that be freaked out is that, all else being equal, a shrinking population means a shrinking GDP. But not everything else needs to be equal.
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