Posted on 12/04/2004 3:41:38 PM PST by traumer
The Japanese government says urgent policy changes are needed to persuade women to have more children.
Japan currently has one of the lowest birth rates in the world. Discrimination in the workplace and poor government policies have been blamed for deterring many Japanese women from having children.
But the government says that unless the trend is reversed quickly, the shortage of children risks doing damage to the economy.
The decline in Japan's birth rate is so severe they have invented a word for it - 'shoshika', meaning a society without children.
Unless women here start having more babies, the population in Japan is expected to shrink more than 20% by the middle of this century. Nearly half would be elderly, placing impossible burdens on the health and pension systems.
An official White Paper which has just been published recommends that the government now focus all its efforts on women born during Japan's last baby-boom, who are now in their 20s and 30s, in a final push to reverse the trend.
Today, record numbers of women in this age group are unmarried and without children. But it is not clear what kind of policies would work.
The government has already introduced a so-called 'Angel Plan', then a 'New Angel Plan', and most recently a 'Plus One Proposal' - all intended to offer more child-care facilities and other benefits for working mothers.
But the biggest obstacle to having families could be social attitudes. Men are still expected to spend long hours at the office and little time at home, while there is pressure on women to give up work when they have children.
A former prime minister who is in charge of the governing party's committee on population famously told women to stay at home and breed.
It is attitudes like that, still commonplace here - and not policies - which Japanese women say are putting them off getting married.
Congratulations in advance on your new arrival! We had our 6th a few days before Christmas 2001 ... it's wonderful sitting by the Christmas tree holding a new baby :-).
Have to weigh in here. I gave up a high paying job to stay home with my kids. Do my husband and I have all the baubles our friends from college have? Of course not, but with intelligent use of the money we do have, we lack for nothing important. And what we get in return is priceless--time with our children, less stress, less stuff cluttering our days. And our children go to the best school they possible could, "mom's school."
Several years ago, yes...near where I grew up.
But as the years tick by, I'm beginning to wonder if I HAVE to move if I'm gonna have any kind of future. Just dunno where! Mostly I'm just teasing, though.
You have a beautiful family!
I always thought that Netherlands was the most densely populated...
Thanks, we think they're terrific! It would be hard to leave your home, but maybe a move to a booming Southern city would be the right thing, as far as finding a good man ...
I was thinking of this thread this morning at church. I turned around during the second collection and saw a man in his 70's holding a sleeping baby - his grandchild or great-grandchild. He had such a huge smile on his face that I'm surprised the whole congregation didn't look to see where the light was coming from. I could almost see the angels!
Actually, my blond-haired, blue-eyed Sister-in-law went to Japan for her junior year of college, she was majoring in Japanese. Met an English/teacher Japanese grad student, fell in love, got married. That was 15 years ago. Now has four amerasian babies and lives on her in-laws tea and mushroom farm in southern Japan.
She has told me, though, that there is a prejudice shown toward the children, being of mixed race is not all that accepted in Japan.
But, there are some Japanese men who will go for the exotic blond american women.
Good to hear a happy story ... generalizations are always wrong for some :-). Tea and mushroom farm sounds neat!
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