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Number of babies born in Japan is the lowest since records began

japantimes.co.jp

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Re: Number of babies born in Japan is the lowest since records began

#51

Post by asianthrowaway »

bayesian_horse wrote: post #48
hnauz wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It would be better if they gave incentives to their own for having children.

Why would that be better? If that worked, it will take 20 to 30 years to see any improvement in the workforce, but will cost a lot up-front. However, financial incentives have never worked. In fact, I don't know of a single political measure which has significantly raise birth rates. The only way that might work would be to discourage women's education, which of course nobody wants (I hope...). Children are massively…

Because immigrants are here to stay. This will forever change the demographic composition of Japan.

I think one only has to look at Europe to see that mass immigration of low skilled labor from foreign cultures does a lot of harm in the long run.

Re: Number of babies born in Japan is the lowest since records began

#52

Post by zozbot123 »

bayesian_horse wrote: post #48
hnauz wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It would be better if they gave incentives to their own for having children.

Why would that be better? If that worked, it will take 20 to 30 years to see any improvement in the workforce, but will cost a lot up-front. However, financial incentives have never worked. In fact, I don't know of a single political measure which has significantly raise birth rates. The only way that might work would be to discourage women's education, which of course nobody wants (I hope...). Children are massively…

> I don't know of a single political measure which has significantly raise birth rates.

Economic freedom, and getting rid of pervasive and extreme rent-seeking (especially at the local level) which raises the cost of caring for kids, and for the kids themselves to start a new household when they grow up. You can see this in places as different politically as the Scandinavian countries (e.g. Denmark), and the U.S. "Red" states. It just works, it's simply anathema in every way to all sorts of out-of-touch elites.

Re: Number of babies born in Japan is the lowest since records began

#53

Post by candiodari »

asianthrowaway wrote: post #44
marsrover wrote: post #37

Maybe I’m missing something or not thinking it through but why not pay people to have babies based on their status? It would cause more divide between classes but I feel like the ends might justify the means. Great education and job? You get paid more to have a baby. Homeless? You get paid nothing to have a baby. Put the payment on a sliding scale. The lower the birth rate the higher the pay until you cross your desi…

I'm not sure to what extent the problem is due to economics and to what extent it's due to culture. I read recently that half of single men in Japan are virgins, which is quite staggering. Lots of Japanese people seem to have simply "dropped out" of the idea of having an intimate relationship, replacing that with video games and pornography. When I lived in Japan, what struck me was how infantile and coddled the whol…

I think one of the main impediments to having children is just having space for them. You cannot have a child in a 40m2 apartment, and more is very hard to get in so many places. Certainly not for the people usually inclined to have babies (ie. the poor).

I don't know but Tokyo is probably similar.

Re: Number of babies born in Japan is the lowest since records began

#54

Post by kaibee »

madengr wrote: post #42
jvln wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Funny. If imported ppl were IQ=72 they would not hijack Norway wellfear system :D

Most immigrant households in the USA are on welfare. https://cis.org/Report/Welfare-Use-Immigrant-and-Native-Hous...

> A September 2015 report by CIS asserted that "immigrant households receive 41 percent more federal welfare than households headed by native-born citizens."[78] The report was criticized on the basis of poor methodology by Alex Nowrasteh of the Cato Institute. Nowrasteh said that the report opted not to examine how much welfare immigrants use, but to examine households led by an immigrant so that the report could count the welfare usage of the immigrant's US-born children, which leads to a misleading estimate of immigrant welfare use.[78]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Center_for_Immigration_Studies

"Center of Immigration Studies" seems like a very dubious source of information when even Cato is criticizing them.

https://www.cato.org/blog/center-immigration-studies-oversta...

Re: Number of babies born in Japan is the lowest since records began

#55

Post by bayesian_horse »

asianthrowaway wrote: post #51
bayesian_horse wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why would that be better? If that worked, it will take 20 to 30 years to see any improvement in the workforce, but will cost a lot up-front. However, financial incentives have never worked. In fact, I don't know of a single political measure which has significantly raise birth rates. The only way that might work would be to discourage women's education, which of course nobody wants (I hope...). Children are massively…

Because immigrants are here to stay. This will forever change the demographic composition of Japan. I think one only has to look at Europe to see that mass immigration of low skilled labor from foreign cultures does a lot of harm in the long run.

So far the immigration of low skilled workers has worked out quite well here in Germany. We still have a better social welfare system, better health care (overall), free university and so on...

Turkish, Italian and Polish immigrants, most of them unskilled at arrival, have contributed hugely to Germany's success in the past century, and they still do.

The "long term harm" is blown well out of proportion, and to ignore that history is at best dishonest...

Re: Number of babies born in Japan is the lowest since records began

#56

Post by MichaelApproved »

reustle wrote: post #43
marsrover wrote: post #37

Maybe I’m missing something or not thinking it through but why not pay people to have babies based on their status? It would cause more divide between classes but I feel like the ends might justify the means. Great education and job? You get paid more to have a baby. Homeless? You get paid nothing to have a baby. Put the payment on a sliding scale. The lower the birth rate the higher the pay until you cross your desi…

A tax for _not_ having babies? I don't think that will go over so well...

People in the US are taxed for _not_ having babies and no one is taking to the streets over it.

If you have a child, you get a tax deduction (or credit? I forget). That is effectively the same as a tax for not having a baby.

Someone with a child pays less taxes than someone without.

Re: Number of babies born in Japan is the lowest since records began

#57

Post by bobthechef »

sdwa wrote: post #28
erpaa wrote: post #8

Good Idea actually. In Norway this issue was studied when it still was still politically possible. The probability of a baby becoming "marginaliserad" ie social fuck-up was 40% for single mothers, 20% for working mothers and "incredibly low" for full-time mothers. Babies have no absolute intrinsic value perse, this is why replacing natives with imported IQ-72 people does not work.

The "IQ-72" people do not have the gumption to leave their home countries in the first place.

That's a simplistic view. Immigrants and expats are a diverse bunch.

Re: Number of babies born in Japan is the lowest since records began

#58

Post by bayesian_horse »

zozbot123 wrote: post #52
bayesian_horse wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why would that be better? If that worked, it will take 20 to 30 years to see any improvement in the workforce, but will cost a lot up-front. However, financial incentives have never worked. In fact, I don't know of a single political measure which has significantly raise birth rates. The only way that might work would be to discourage women's education, which of course nobody wants (I hope...). Children are massively…

> I don't know of a single political measure which has significantly raise birth rates. Economic freedom, and getting rid of pervasive and extreme rent-seeking (especially at the local level) which raises the cost of caring for kids, and for the kids themselves to start a new household when they grow up. You can see this in places as different politically as the Scandinavian countries (e.g. Denmark), and the U.S. "Re…

You're not citing facts, just anecdotes. It's hard to argue that Denmark is seeing a long-term rise in birth rates, let alone attribute that to any one such factor. And guess what, Denmark had a lot of immigration...

As for the US "Red" states it gets even more complicated, and part of that equation is the religiosity and that those who can afford it, and maybe would have fewer children anyway, just flee those areas in mass...

Re: Number of babies born in Japan is the lowest since records began

#59

Post by imustbeevil »

MichaelApproved wrote: post #56
reustle wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A tax for _not_ having babies? I don't think that will go over so well...

People in the US are taxed for _not_ having babies and no one is taking to the streets over it. If you have a child, you get a tax deduction (or credit? I forget). That is effectively the same as a tax for not having a baby. Someone with a child pays less taxes than someone without.

That's like saying getting paid is a tax on unemployed people.

Re: Number of babies born in Japan is the lowest since records began

#60

Post by sprash »

If the Japanese government wants to do the right thing, all it has to do is to let the population contract even further until Asset prices begin to freefall.

Then everything will be affordable again for young Japanese citizens and a good longterm economic outlook for the future is the best thing you can do to stimulate birthrates.

If Japan wants to screw it up, it should allow mass immigration. This way asset prices can stay high and the native Japanese will eventually cease to exist. We will speak of them in the future as great ancient civilization. Similarly we speak of ancient Greeks today.

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