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Over 40% of Japanese women born in 2005 could end up childless: Government estimate points to deepening decline, raising questions for social security
Nikkei Asia ^ | 08/16/2023 | ERIKO FUKUYAMA

Posted on 08/16/2023 9:11:30 PM PDT by SeekAndFind

TOKYO -- Up to 42% of Japanese women born in 2005 could end up not having children in their lifetimes, according to a government estimate, a high percentage that could threaten the future of its social security program.

Japan's National Institute of Population and Social Security Research gives this estimate for women born in 2005 under its low-birth scenario. In the medium scenario, 33.4% of this group will go through their childbearing years without having kids. In the most optimistic case, the rate will be 24.6%.

The percentage is even higher for men, who are more likely to be unmarried than women. As many as half of male 18-year-olds will never have children, the report estimates.

The share of people without children is rising in such other developed economies as the U.S. and Europe. This has been attributed to a shift in values as more people focus on self-fulfillment rather than having kids.

In these countries, around 10% to 20% of women born in 1970 never had children. The share in Japan is significantly higher at 27% and could end up at more than double Western levels if American and European rates stay around their current levels.

The trend of not having children has lost some momentum in the U.S., the U.K. and Germany over the past few years. Efforts to make it easier to balance work with raising a family have encouraged more people to opt for at least one child.

Japan has also been trying to create a better environment for prospective parents with measures like its work-style reforms.

But young people have become less interested in marriage and children amid stagnant wages and deep-seated uncertainty about the future. The institute's National Fertility Survey for 2021 found a surge in the number of unmarried young people who are fine with the idea of staying single for life.

While China and South Korea have seen birthrates plunge over the past several years, their declines started later than that of Japan, which is among the first to grapple with a rise in the population of older adults without children.

In Japan, hospitals and nursing care facilities require a family member to serve as a guarantor, and it can be difficult for those without relatives to rent homes.

"There needs to be an urgent discussion on building a social safety net in every area -- including pensions, medical care, nursing care and living assistance -- that does not disadvantage people without family, along with funding," said social security expert Takashi Oshio, a professor at Hitotsubashi University's Institute of Economic Research.


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Foreign Affairs; Japan; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: birthrate; demographics; japan; socialsecurity
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1 posted on 08/16/2023 9:11:30 PM PDT by SeekAndFind
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To: SeekAndFind
Nature is unforgiving. An unproductive people have no business, and should have no expectation, of sticking around.

2 posted on 08/16/2023 9:21:17 PM PDT by Right_Wing_Madman
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To: SeekAndFind
Efforts to make it easier to balance work with raising a family have encouraged more people to opt for at least one child.

I see the media will again apply similarly stupid, facile and incorrect explanations for destructive social phenomena, as they do with crime, broken families, LGBTQ, abortion, etc...

3 posted on 08/16/2023 9:34:41 PM PDT by PGR88
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To: SeekAndFind

Japanese women have their problems that are contributing to this occurring.


4 posted on 08/16/2023 9:38:22 PM PDT by Secret Agent Man (Gone Galt; not averse to Going Bronson.)
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To: SeekAndFind

Childlessness is the price of socialism.


5 posted on 08/16/2023 9:39:54 PM PDT by Jonty30 (If liberals were truth tellers, they'd call themselves literals. )
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To: Secret Agent Man

The unforgiving Bushido code that all Japanese live under is probably playing a part in this. If a man is slightly imperfect, Japanese women don’t want to have anything to do with him.

Hence, herbivore men.


6 posted on 08/16/2023 9:41:12 PM PDT by Jonty30 (If liberals were truth tellers, they'd call themselves literals. )
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To: Jonty30

Not quite, childlessness increases as a society gets materially richer.


7 posted on 08/16/2023 9:42:16 PM PDT by Cronos (I identify as an ambulance, my pronounces are wee/woo)
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To: SeekAndFind

What can we do, if big numbers of young people, just aren’t interested in marriage and family?

I’ve heard there used to be more “social pressure”, if that’s the right term, for young people to find somebody and get married. Young women were said to go to college and get their “MRS” degree. This happened before my time, but I’ve heard our culture was very different decades ago. Young people were encouraged to get married. Young people wanted to get married.

Nowadays, there seems no social stigma or sanction against not being married and having children.

I know some people, friends of the family, a number of families with adult children in their 20s and 30s. The vast majority of those adult children are not married. Few of them have children, so the next generation of those families will be smaller than the previous generations.


8 posted on 08/16/2023 9:42:46 PM PDT by Dilbert San Diego
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To: Jonty30

They have had bushido for centuries and not had this problem.

The root cause is that their rat race culture means little to no time for family


9 posted on 08/16/2023 9:43:21 PM PDT by Cronos (I identify as an ambulance, my pronounces are wee/woo)
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To: Cronos

There is some correlation between having less children and wealth, but for the 20th century Western World it was because of socialism and the empowerment of women.

Socialism made children too expensive to have.
The empowerment of women supersized their desire for hypergamy, because women still wanted men to be the greater partner but they have less men available to them that are still greater than they are.


10 posted on 08/16/2023 9:44:24 PM PDT by Jonty30 (If liberals were truth tellers, they'd call themselves literals. )
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To: Right_Wing_Madman
Nature is unforgiving. An unproductive people have no business, and should have no expectation, of sticking around.

Just a reminder that our reproductive rate is also below the replacement rate. If not for immigration, the population of the US would also be in decline. Japan is showing us our future.
11 posted on 08/16/2023 9:44:39 PM PDT by AnotherUnixGeek
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To: SeekAndFind
> Up to 42% of Japanese women born in 2005 could end up not having children in their lifetimes,

When else would they have them?

12 posted on 08/16/2023 9:46:04 PM PDT by Flatus I. Maximus (If Black Lives Matter, explain Chicago. )
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To: Cronos

It’s still part of their value system. Japanese societies are still unforgiving societies when they make mistakes. It’s just been driven internally.

Their willingness to work 18 hour days would be part of their fear of making a mistake.


13 posted on 08/16/2023 9:47:40 PM PDT by Jonty30 (If liberals were truth tellers, they'd call themselves literals. )
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To: AnotherUnixGeek
Just a reminder that our reproductive rate is also below the replacement rate. If not for immigration, the population of the US would also be in decline.

...and who says that wouldn't be a natural, normal thing?

Did anyone really think they could keep packing people in Japan into metal and glass boxes like sardines without any of them saying "enough"?

The ones who push for Replacement Americans to be wage slaves are the globalists who are determined to monetize every aspect of life in order to make money servicing the debt.

Make no mistake, they have been trying for a century to have wage slaves living in housing projects in "15 Minute Cities". It's not a surprise they traffic children too.

14 posted on 08/16/2023 10:09:49 PM PDT by T.B. Yoits
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To: SeekAndFind

They will have even fewer “crumb crunchers” after taking the parasite filled “cov-19 vaxx”.


15 posted on 08/16/2023 10:28:35 PM PDT by Greg123456
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To: SeekAndFind

If I was young and unemcumbered, I could offer some assistance.


16 posted on 08/16/2023 10:30:54 PM PDT by dfwgator (Endut! Hoch Hech!)
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To: dfwgator

RE: If I was young and unemcumbered, I could offer some assistance.

Ahhh, but are you willing to shoulder the expenses and responsibilities should your assistance succeed? :)


17 posted on 08/16/2023 10:32:30 PM PDT by SeekAndFind
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To: Jonty30
The empowerment of women supersized their desire for hypergamy, because women still wanted men to be the greater partner but they have less men available to them that are still greater than they are.

The article supports your statement:

The percentage is even higher for men, who are more likely to be unmarried than women. As many as half of male 18-year-olds will never have children, the report estimates.

Instead of "pairing up" in an equitable fashion (a female "10" on the 1-10 scale of Sexual Market Value bonds with a male "10;" a female "5" marries a male "5;" and so on), 80% of the women are happy to share the top 10% of the men.

Hypergamy on full display!

Regards,

18 posted on 08/16/2023 10:38:37 PM PDT by alexander_busek (Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.)
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To: Flatus I. Maximus
Up to 42% of Japanese women born in 2005 could end up not having children in their lifetimes

When else would they have them?

Now you're being deliberately dense. (Or just having fun?)

A study could, conceivably, make predictions about the reproductive behavior of a group of people for a short span of time - say, for the next five years. This study instead makes predictions about their lifetime reproductive performance.

Regards,

19 posted on 08/16/2023 10:43:19 PM PDT by alexander_busek (Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.)
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To: SeekAndFind; dfwgator

“… Japanese women born in 2005 …”

Let’s see. It’s 2023… I need to do some cyphering…

OK. I’ll do it!


20 posted on 08/16/2023 10:45:12 PM PDT by VanShuyten ("...that all the donkeys were dead. I know nothing as to the fate of the less valuable animals)
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