Japanese researchers have unveiled a population clock that showed the nation's people could theoretically become extinct in 1000 years because of declining birth rates.
Academics in the northern city of Sendai said that Japan's population of children aged up to 14, which now stands at 16.6 million, is shrinking at the rate of one every 100 seconds.
Their extrapolations pointed to a Japan with no children left within a millennium.
"If the rate of decline continues, we will be able to celebrate the Children's Day public holiday on May 5, 3011 as there will be one child," said Hiroshi Yoshida, an economics professor at Tohoku University.
"But 100 seconds later there will be no children left," he said. "The overall trend is towards extinction, which started in 1975 when Japan's fertility rate fell below two."
http://au.news.yahoo.com/world/a/-/worl ... 000-years/
Currently Japan is facing a baby and a marriage shortage, the two go rather hand in hand. With men and women waiting till much later to get married, the number of children keeps decreasing. There's two competing theories (with a subset) as to why this might be happening.
What's interesting is that this is not just a Japan only problem. Developed countries around Asia are experiencing a rapidly graying population and a shrinking young one. Even China and India, the Asian giants, are sitting on a population time bomb (Though both of them are partiality due to sex-selective abortions/China's one child policy). Pretty much Asian women are holding off of marriage as their education improves and their opportunities to find fulfillment through their jobs broadens and Asian men are finding that life is more fun without the responsibilities their culture attaches to married life.
Various Asian countries are experimenting with different ways of trying to alleviate this issue from ignoring it (China), ineffectual hand-wringing (Japan), to encouraging immigration (Singapore).
So what's NSG's take on this? While this might sound like as Asian only problem, it should be noted that Europe faces declining birthrates and the US's growth is mainly due to immigration and minority births. 3rd Generation+ Americans also are not exactly being fruitful and multiplying. Crashing populations do have some rather profound consequences including an unsupported social safety net, or, like in the above article, extinction of that nation. So noting that it's impossible for a government to legislate social change, what can be, should be, done?
