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It’s sad to see a country just fade away. I hope they can convince their people to breed more or let in more immigrants while still maintaining their culture.
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The US is extremely successful (well economically, anyway..)
Because of immigration it will mostly avoid the aging issue (based on current predictions it should surpass China in population by the end of the century)
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Yeah, the US and Canada are the only two first world countries not slated for long-term population decline due to immigration. Japan is going to have to be more welcoming of non-Japanese people.
None of the countries you mention have ages old strong own culture to preserve really (except first nations but for various reasons their culture is not US or Canada culture). So Japan's policy is not unreasonable. You can become a proper Japanese if you want to (are willing to culturally integrate), it's just that not many people do. Without it you'd be trading off death of country for death of culture. Contrast to…
Modern Japanese culture has its roots almost entirely in the 19th century and the post WW2 era.
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In the long term human populations have fluctuated wildly. As demographics get bad and Japan gets poorer I'd bet they will start having more children.
You have to look at why the birthrate is low. People are working themselves to (nearly) death, and the worsening demographics is not helping. It's hard to commit to have three children (which is what everybody will have to aim for if the birthrate is to hold or grow) when you go to work in the early hours and come home after ten PM (or later, as people I know do), and when salaries haven't actually increased since fo…
Like how japan like most of Asia is so fixated on materialism with even marriage still being heavily influenced by it (hence why theres a lot of dysfunctional marriages in japan).
Will it ultimate entail a slow rise or will it spiral further down?
If I were to be an armchair prime Minister, beyond focusing on class inequality, social and cultural norms there's one radical immigration policy I would toy around with giving international amnesty to orphans around the world.
And placing them either in foster care or in a highly coordinated communinitarian community (essentially everythingfrom social workers, teachers, police to young and old people in a district/city would be tasked with raising these kids).
While it could backfire or lead to abuse, if run properly and it works it should be a huge win-win for both the orphan and the country (since adopted kids should have a higher likelihood of being fully integrated), but given japan does have a very strong attitude of "gaijin vs watashitachi-jin" i.e. anyone who's not japanese or japanese looking is a foreigner and no matter how hard you try you will never be a true japanese person.
I can't help but feel that Japan is once again a decade or two ahead of everybody else in a weird sense. When the boomer generation retires many countries will have to face similar problems and many western nations are already essentially governed by people that would/should be retired and can't find it in their hearts to give the levers of power to all the generations that came after them. As a young person who will…
I think that's true, but only in a restricted sence - the Anglosphere countries and swathes of Western Europe (plus some others) are some of the most immigration-friendly countrie sin the world; Japan (and the rest of East Asia) is not.
> many western nations are already essentially governed by people that would/should be retired
This is surpringly a mainly US phenomenon: https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2023/03/24/who-are-t...
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Perhaps you can enlighten what part of their culture makes them "fade away"?
Well the lack of focus on family and making it economically, culturally and politically beneficial to younger people especially women to have children would be an extremely obvious one.
Things are changing policy-wise to make it easier to raise a family. They're moving fast in that regard and I've witnessed many of these changes firsthand since becoming a father, especially where paternity leave and childcare payments are concerned.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tobacco_consumption_by_count...
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_life_ex...
It’s sad to see a country just fade away. I hope they can convince their people to breed more or let in more immigrants while still maintaining their culture.
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Benjamin Franklin was very worried about German immigrants in the US and he described them as "less intelligent", "aliens" and that they won't assimilate. Fast forward few decades later/centries later, Germans are one of the most successful immigrants group in the US, industrialising the country, creating financial institutions, and becoming military and political leaders, giving US presidents and generals. Recently, Asian immigrants created Silicon companies. One of them is a trillion dollar company called Nvidia.
France has a huge success story with immigrants as well, the poles (Marie Curie), the Italians, the Portuguese, North Africans, etc.
There are certain issues here and there, especially with unregulated modern mass migration, but in my opinion, that's not a true representation of real immigration that has always happened since the beginning of time.
The fact that Sweden has integration issues with mass migration from war-torn Syria is a special case.
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Nice xenophobia there buddy
Why shouldn't they be allowed to protect that culture if they want? Why does every country have to standardised down to some global culture that is all the same?
Of course we know the answer, that makes for a great global market and government, but it's amazing how it's the left that's actually advocating for this these days.
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US is literally built on immigration!! Millions of Germans, Italians, Japenese, Persians, Chinese, Indians immigrated to the US since the 18th century. Benjamin Franklin was very worried about German immigrants in the US and he described them as "less intelligent", "aliens" and that they won't assimilate. Fast forward few decades later/centries later, Germans are one of the most successful immigrants group in the US,…
Oh boy, I would like to hear the "success story" even much more than I would like to continue discussing other things :)