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Twice as many people die in Japan as are born. The country’s population is in freefall. And Japan’s Prime Minister has already been sounding the alarms over the falling birth rate.
“Japan is standing on the verge of whether we can continue to function as a society,” Fumio Kishida told lawmakers a few months ago.
In 2022, these birth rate numbers plummeted to another record low of 799,728. This was the first ever dip below 800,000.
Deaths, on the contrary, hit a record high last year. Totaling 1.58 million, or nearly double.
“Focusing attention on policies regarding children and child-rearing is an issue that cannot wait and cannot be postponed,” Kishida said.
Kishida – dubbing Japan’s declining birth rate as a “now or never” situation – feels it crucial to double the government’s spending on child related programs.
Back in January, the BBC outlined factors that could be driving this declining birth rate including, but are not limited to, rising living costs (like how real wages haven’t grown in 30 years), more women in education and work, as well as greater access to contraception.
America has also seen a similar pattern in its declining birth rate in recent years due to the same reasons; a push to move more women away from the home with contraception and abortion serving as the safety mechanism for that wave.