What happens if Japan takes in zero immigrants? • Hacker News Board

Re: What happens if Japan takes in zero immigrants?

#21

Post by jesterson » Fri, Jun 05, 2026, 4:29 AM UTC

outside1234 wrote: post #15

jesterson wrote: post #7

[flagged]

First generation immigrants to the EU do not have higher rates of crime vs. natively born citizens. (Go ahead, google it). This is a far right talking point, but it simply not true.* * https://cordis.europa.eu/article/id/20635-eu-research-dispro...

I am not going to debate on manipulation of one cherry picked number.

If your point is that crime hasn't risen up since EU started to receive "refugees" in droves, you are either not living in EU or prefer to ignore wider evidence dismissing it as "far-right talking point" (whatever that is)

Re: What happens if Japan takes in zero immigrants?

#22

Post by Tor3 » Fri, Jun 05, 2026, 4:30 AM UTC

eska wrote: post #10

There is no “zero” immigration policy, this is a strawman. Controlled immigration is different from opening the floodgates. Also weird to admit that no country has reversed its birth rate problem, but still insist upon massive immigration being the solution.

Japan's population is dropping like a stone. Since I first arrived here some years ago the population has gone down by several millions. Countries which have more immigration (like my native one, also with a low birth rate) manage to keep up the population size, and, equally important, manage to keep the median age somewhat lower (the median age in Japan is now above 50).

If immigration is not a solution, then I assume you mean that reversing the birth rate problem is the way to go. Can't disagree there, but how do you propose to do that? No country with a birth rate below 2 seems to have been able to come up with a way to "fix" that.

(The worldometer site makes it easy to look up and compare various countries: https://www.worldometers.info/world-population/japan-populat...)

Re: What happens if Japan takes in zero immigrants?

#23

Post by jesterson » Fri, Jun 05, 2026, 4:32 AM UTC

ares623 wrote: post #18

jesterson wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's possible, but at this point we don't know yet how each will play out long term. EU chose to destroy itself fast, while Japan chose slow economic demise. Only time will tell how each will play out.

Surely the tech culture on HN would prefer the "move fast and break things" approach? Faster and tighter loops right?

I am not sure tech approach is a right way to go if we project it at wider scale on a society or a country.

Society moves at way slower pace, and wrong turns may takes decades to rectify. Needless to say wrong turns may have horrible ramifications lasting decades as well.

If you'd ask me, I would certainly be against tech approach here. Lets leave it where it does play well.

Re: What happens if Japan takes in zero immigrants?

#24

Post by malicka » Fri, Jun 05, 2026, 4:32 AM UTC

jesterson wrote: post #7

[flagged]

> crime rate hikes.

No, not really. Broadly, immigration has no effect on crime-rates. In case-study after case-study, it’s shown immigration has little to no impact on crime-rates. This was even disproven after the height of the Syrian refuge crisis! But media likes sensationalist reporting, so public perception doesn’t match the statistics.

> cultural demise.

Meaningless, also created by the media. If you listen to the media, Britain is under the fierce grip of Sharia law, enforced by… the 6% of the population that is Muslim. Yes, yes, how scary. I guess English culture was pretty weak, to meet its demise from such a meager blip.

Re: What happens if Japan takes in zero immigrants?

#25

Post by lmm » Fri, Jun 05, 2026, 4:32 AM UTC

ares623 wrote: post #5

SV_BubbleTime wrote: post #4

They’ll find it easy to keep their homogenous culture and shared traditional values. Why would the solution to “our people aren’t having enough babies” be “we should import different people to have their babies here”? Why does ever single bleeding heart liberal globalist try and ignore the deep psychological truths about human tribalism? It’s not even a bad thing, but even if it was, it’s a fact.

I think the point is we can't have our cake and eat it too. They need _someone_ (or something, if they can manage) to sustain the way of life they hold so dear. And it's not something a country can just decide on a whim like "oop looks like we really need more people tomorrow folks". What are they going to do? Import millions of people 18 years from now? Or plan ahead to make sure millions of babies are born now to g…

> They need _someone_ (or something, if they can manage) to sustain the way of life they hold so dear.

They don't though? Pensions will be cut. Retirements will be pushed back. Grandparents with dementia will be kept mostly-alive in their children's homes rather than getting proper care. There will be pain and suffering. But I don't see any of that pushing the country to breaking point.

> And it's not something a country can just decide on a whim like "oop looks like we really need more people tomorrow folks". What are they going to do? Import millions of people 18 years from now? Or plan ahead to make sure millions of babies are born now to grow into the people they like 18 years from now?

As hard as fixing a low population is, it's easier than fixing a society where trust has broken down, which is what the western countries that went hard on immigration are already starting to face.

Re: What happens if Japan takes in zero immigrants?

#26

Post by Tor3 » Fri, Jun 05, 2026, 4:33 AM UTC

Erem wrote: post #20

eska wrote: post #10

There is no “zero” immigration policy, this is a strawman. Controlled immigration is different from opening the floodgates. Also weird to admit that no country has reversed its birth rate problem, but still insist upon massive immigration being the solution.

Korea is starting to turn things around! https://www.theguardian.com/world/2026/feb/25/south-korea-bi...

Fertility rate of 0.80.. and I thought Japan, Italy, and my own country had problems. Note however that https://www.worldometers.info/world-population/south-korea-p... says 0.76, and last year was 0.75, so there's barely any change there. Catastrophically low birth rate, and maybe it's not so hard to figure out why.

Re: What happens if Japan takes in zero immigrants?

#27

Post by chaostheory » Fri, Jun 05, 2026, 4:34 AM UTC

eska wrote: post #10

There is no “zero” immigration policy, this is a strawman. Controlled immigration is different from opening the floodgates. Also weird to admit that no country has reversed its birth rate problem, but still insist upon massive immigration being the solution.

> weird to admit that no country has reversed its birth rate problem, but still insist upon massive immigration being the solution.

How exactly is this weird when you don’t want your population to decline? Like it or not, every modern economic system whether it’s capitalism or socialism relies on population growth.

Re: What happens if Japan takes in zero immigrants?

#28

Post by malicka » Fri, Jun 05, 2026, 4:34 AM UTC

jesterson wrote: post #21

outside1234 wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

First generation immigrants to the EU do not have higher rates of crime vs. natively born citizens. (Go ahead, google it). This is a far right talking point, but it simply not true.* * https://cordis.europa.eu/article/id/20635-eu-research-dispro...

I am not going to debate on manipulation of one cherry picked number. If your point is that crime hasn't risen up since EU started to receive "refugees" in droves, you are either not living in EU or prefer to ignore wider evidence dismissing it as "far-right talking point" (whatever that is)

Crime-rates going up + Immigrants being no more likely to commit crimes = There is no causality

Re: What happens if Japan takes in zero immigrants?

#29

Post by flakiness » Fri, Jun 05, 2026, 4:35 AM UTC

Erem wrote: post #20

eska wrote: post #10

There is no “zero” immigration policy, this is a strawman. Controlled immigration is different from opening the floodgates. Also weird to admit that no country has reversed its birth rate problem, but still insist upon massive immigration being the solution.

Korea is starting to turn things around! https://www.theguardian.com/world/2026/feb/25/south-korea-bi...

Maybe the fertility rate has to go below zero to bounce back... Japan's rate is like 1.14 yet [1].

Hopefully Korea has figure out something more actionable

[1] https://english.kyodonews.net/articles/-/77220

Re: What happens if Japan takes in zero immigrants?

#30

Post by bulbar » Fri, Jun 05, 2026, 4:35 AM UTC

eska wrote: post #10

There is no “zero” immigration policy, this is a strawman. Controlled immigration is different from opening the floodgates. Also weird to admit that no country has reversed its birth rate problem, but still insist upon massive immigration being the solution.

> Also weird to admit that no country has reversed its birth rate problem, but still insist upon massive immigration being the solution.

Because those "floodgates" for the most part have never existed and are just fear inducing rhetoric. Immigration has always been insignificant in terms of the whole population and therefore can not solve systemic problems alone.