New Low of Births

It is officially proved that Japan keeps on demographically shrinking. In the survey of demographic moves of population by Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare released on Friday, births in Japan in 2016 were 976,679, reducing by 28,698 from the previous year, marking new record of lower than 1 million for the first time since the beginning of the survey in 1899. Low production of new baby has gone to the level over a century ago.

Number of deaths of the Japanese last year marked 1,037,765, marking new high after the World War II. Natural loss of population was 330,786, which was the new record in the history of the survey. The tendency of losing population started in 1974, when the second baby boom ended. It is inevitable for Japan to reduce its population, because the generation for parents is shrinking.

Total fertility rate, which indicates how many children a woman would give birth in her lifetime, was 1.44 in 2016, reducing by 0.1 point from the previous year. Although it has been improving after it marked the lowest record of 1.26 in 2013, the rate did not show clear increase after 2014. The rate showed a slight increase in the age from 35 to 44, it declined in the age of 34 or younger. The rate needed to be 2.07 or higher to maintain the population.

Shinzo Abe administration upholds a goal of maintaining 100 million of population in latter half of 2020s and 1.8 of hopeful fertility rate, which indicates the number of children for a woman who hopes to give births. But, the survey showed the difficulty of fulfilling it. “It is extremely serious problem,” told Chief Cabinet Secretary, Yoshihide Suga. “A lot of elements, such as economic instability of young people and unofficially employed workers or isolation and heavy burden in raising children, are connecting each other.”

Marriages were also the fewest ever after the end of World War II, which were 620,523 couples, marking four consecutive annual reductions from the previous year. Having overwhelming concern on their future, young people are getting reluctant to be married and have a new family. Low wage makes them pessimistic on their ability of making their spouses happy and maintaining family. The greatest reason of hesitating marriage was scarcity of financial resources.

The government of Japan recognizes that the tendency of high-age marriage or no marriage will keep on affecting birth rate. While it is required that society as a whole helps parents raise kids, poor social security or financial gap between the families discourage young generation to get married and give births. Welfare policies of Abe administration based on the concept of self-help have not been sufficient for the ones suffering from low income.