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"More Scarecrows Than People": A Tragic Preview Of Japan's Terminal Collapse
A few weeks ago it was revealed that the mystery person behind the latest bout of monetary (if not so much fiscal) insanity in Japan is none other than Paul Krugman, a fact which has since assured the fate of Japan as a failed state: the demographically imploding country now has at best a few years (if not less) before it implodes into a hyperinflationary supernova. And for a very graphic, and tragic, preview of Japan's endgame - the direct result of following Keynesian and monetarist policies to a tee - we go to the AP, which looks at the village of Nagoro, located "deep in the rugged mountains of southern Japan once was home to hundreds of families" and finds that now, only 35 people remain, outnumbered three-to-one by scarecrows that Tsukimi Ayano crafted to help fill the days and replace neighbors who died or moved away. This and nothing more, is what all of Japan has to look forward to as it slowly (or very rapidly) fades away to nothing.
At 65, Ayano is one of the younger residents of Nagoro. She moved back from Osaka to look after her 85-year-old father after decades away.
"They bring back memories," Ayano said of the life-sized dolls crowded into corners of her farmhouse home, perched on fences and trees, huddled side-by-side at a produce stall, the bus stop, anywhere a living person might stop to take a rest.
"That old lady used to come and chat and drink tea. That old man used to love to drink sake and tell stories. It reminds me of the old times, when they were still alive and well," she said.
Even more than its fading status as an export superpower, Japan's dwindling population may be its biggest challenge. More than 10,000 towns and villages in Japan are depopulated, the homes and infrastructure crumbling as the countryside empties thanks to the falling birthrate and rapid aging.
In Japan's northeast, the massive earthquake and tsunami that struck in March 2011, killing more than 18,000 people, merely hastened along the decline.
First the jobs go. Then the schools. Eventually, the electricity meters stop.
Neither Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's ruling Liberal Democratic Party nor any of its rivals have figured out how to "revive localities," an urgent issue that has perplexed Japanese leaders for decades.
But some communities are trying various strategies for attracting younger residents, slowing if not reversing their decline. In Kamiyama, another farming community closer to the regional capital of Tokushima, community organizers have mapped out a strategy for attracting artists and high-tech companies.
Nagoro is more typical of the thousands of communities that are turning into ghost towns or at best, open-air museums, frozen in time — a trend evident even in downtown Tokyo and in nearly or completely empty villages in the city's suburbs.
The one-street town is mostly abandoned, its shops and homes permanently shuttered.
The closure of the local elementary school two years ago was the last straw. Ayano unlocks the door and guides visitors through spotless classrooms populated with scarecrow students and teachers.
When she returned to her hometown 13 years ago, Ayano tried farming. Thinking her radish seeds may have been eaten by crows, she decided to make some scarecrows. By now there are more 100 scattered around Nagoro and other towns in Shikoku.
Like handcarved Buddhist sculptures, each has its own whimsical expression. Some sleep, their eyelids permanently shut. Others cuddle toddler scarecrows, or man plows and hoes.
Ayano brings one along for company on her 90-minute drive to buy groceries in the nearest big town. But most remain behind, to be photographed and marveled at by tourists who detour through the winding mountain roads.
"If I hadn't made these scarecrows, people would just drive right by," said Ayano, who greets a steady stream of visitors who wander through the village.
The plight of Japan's countryside partly a consequence of the country's economic success. As the nation grew increasingly affluent after World War II, younger Japanese flooded into the cities to fill jobs in factories and service industries, leaving their elders to tend small farms.
Greater Tokyo, with more than 37 million people and Osaka-Kobe, with 11.5 million, account for nearly 40 percent of the country's 127 million people, with another 10 million scattered in a handful of provincial capitals.
"There's been this huge sucking sound as the countryside is emptied," said Joel Cohen, a professor at Columbia University's Laboratory of Populations.
Japan's population began to decline in 2010 from a peak of 128 million. Without a drastic increase in the birthrate or a loosening of the staunch Japanese resistance to immigration, it is forecast to fall to about 108 million by 2050 and to 87 million by 2060.
By then, four in 10 Japanese will be over 65 years old.
The government has a target of preventing the population from falling below 100 million, but efforts to convince Japanese women to have more babies have yielded meager results. Young Japanese continue to drift from the countryside into big cities such as Tokyo, where the birthrate is a mere 1.13 children, thanks to long working hours, high costs and killer commutes.
The population of Miyoshi, which is the town closest to Nagoro, fell from 45,340 in 1985 to about 27,000 last year. A quarter of its population is over 75 years old. To entice residents to have more children, the town began offering free nursery care for third children, free diapers and formula to age 2 and free health care through junior high school.
"The way to stop this is to get people to have more babies," said Kurokawa, whose own three children and seven grandchildren still live in the area. "Apart from that, we need for people to return here or move here. We need them all."
But it's not an easy sell, despite the fresh air and abundant space.
"You can't just grab people by the necks like kittens and drag them here," Kurokawa said. "They have to want to live here."
To match potential occupants with empty homes, towns like Miyoshi are setting up "empty house banks." Across Japan there are 8.2 million such "akiya," or empty homes, more than a tenth of all residential buildings.
But getting residents of half-empty towns to accept newcomers can also be a challenge. In Kamiyama, to the east, the town still struggles to convince owners who are often relatives living in distant cities to open up abandoned homes for rent or renovation, said Shinya Ominami, chairman of a civic group that has led efforts to revive the town.
Kamiyama, a town of about 6,000, set up an "Artists in Residence" program in 1999. The installation of fiber optic cable enabled the town to begin marketing itself as a location for IT satellite offices with rents as low as 20,000 yen ($200) a month. Eleven companies have come so far.
In a briefing for potential investors and visiting officials from other areas, Ominami shows a slide of the town's shopping street, dotted with houses that are empty, and then another with some of the buildings filled with new businesses — a bistro, a design studio, an IT incubation hub.
"In Kamiyama, 50,000 yen rent gets you a really luxurious property," Ominami said. "Extremely high class."
By drawing in younger new residents and encouraging businesses that cater to them, like an organic foods pizza parlor and a gelateria, the community can actually breathe new life into older, traditional industries like farming, he said.
"People think of decline as something pathetic. That's too vague. We need to think more clearly about this," Ominami said. "Once we accept this is the reality, we can figure out how to cope with it."
* * *
Some advice: don't invite Paul Krugman to tell you "how to cope with reality" - it will only accelerate the all too surreal end.

In this Thursday, Nov. 6, 2014 photo, a teenager look alike scarecrow sits on a log pile in Nagoro, Tokushima Prefecture, southern Japan. This village deep in the rugged mountains of southern Japan once was home to hundreds of families. Now, only 35 people remain, outnumbered three-to-one by scarecrows that Tsukimi Ayano crafted to help fill the days and replace neighbors who died or moved away. (AP Photo/Elaine Kurtenbach)

In this Thursday, Nov. 6, 2014 photo, Tsukimi Ayano speaks as she stitches a scarecrow girl by her outdoor hearth at her home in the mountainous village of Nagoro, Tokushima Prefecture, southern Japan. This village deep in the rugged mountains of southern Japan once was home to hundreds of families. Now, only 35 people remain, outnumbered three-to-one by scarecrows that Ayano crafted to help fill the days and replace neighbors who died or moved away. At 65, Ayano is one of the younger residents of Nagoro. She moved back from Osaka to look after her 85-year-old father after decades away. “They bring back memories,” Ayano said of the life-sized dolls crowded into corners of her farmhouse home. (AP Photo/Elaine Kurtenbach)

In this Thursday, Nov. 6, 2014 photo, scarecrow passengers wait for a bus at a bus stop for scarecrows in Nagoro, Tokushima Prefecture, southern Japan. This village deep in the rugged mountains of southern Japan once was home to hundreds of families. Now, only 35 people remain, outnumbered three-to-one by scarecrows that Tsukimi Ayano crafted to help fill the days and replace neighbors who died or moved away. (AP Photo/Elaine Kurtenbach)

In this Friday, Nov. 7, 2014 photo, a pair of slippers sits ready to be worn outside an abandoned home in Kawamata in Tokushima Prefecture, southern Japan, one of many thousands of empty houses in rural Japan. Japan’s dwindling population is perhaps the country’s biggest challenge, with thousands of communities depopulated, empty homes and infrastructure crumbling as the countryside empties thanks to a low birthrate and rapid aging. (AP Photo/Elaine Kurtenbach)

In this Thursday, Nov. 6, 2014 photo, Tsukimi Ayano stitches a scarecrow girl by her outdoor hearth at her home in Nagoro, Tokushima Prefecture, southern Japan. This village deep in the rugged mountains once was home to hundreds of families. Now, only 35 people remain, outnumbered three-to-one by scarecrows that Ayano crafted to help fill the days and replace neighbors who died or moved away. At 65, Ayano is one of the younger residents of Nagoro. She moved back from Osaka to look after her 85-year-old father after decades away. “They bring back memories,” Ayano said of the life-sized dolls crowded into corners of her farmhouse home. (AP Photo/Elaine Kurtenbach)

In this Thursday, Nov. 6, 2014 photo, white smoke rises from an outdoor hearth at Tsukimi Ayano's house sat by scarecrows she made in Nagoro, Tokushima Prefecture, southern Japan. This village deep in the rugged mountains of southern Japan once was home to hundreds of families. Now, only 35 people remain, outnumbered three-to-one by scarecrows that Ayano crafted to help fill the days and replace neighbors who died or moved away. At 65, Ayano is one of the younger residents of Nagoro. She moved back from Osaka to look after her 85-year-old father after decades away. “They bring back memories,” Ayano said of the life-sized dolls crowded into corners of her farmhouse home. (AP Photo/Elaine Kurtenbach)

In this Thursday, Nov. 6, 2014 photo, scarecrow teacher and students fill a classroom in the now deserted elementary school in Nagoro, Tokushima Prefecture, southern Japan. This village deep in the rugged mountains of southern Japan once was home to hundreds of families. Now, only 35 people remain, outnumbered three-to-one by scarecrows that Tsukimi Ayano crafted to help fill the days and replace neighbors who died or moved away. The closure of the local elementary school two years ago was the last straw. Ayano unlocks the door and guides visitors through spotless classrooms populated with scarecrow students and teachers. (AP Photo/Elaine Kurtenbach)
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oh, foo. Japan destroyed themselves, first with the idiocy of 1930's militarism, and then they followed that with a disastrous experiment in 18th century mercantilism. Closing their doors to most imports, and insisting that food be grown rught up to city boundaries, they created a huge property and stock bubble, which is still not fully unwound.
Land was mispriced because land just outside Tokyo that could have housed millions is still used to farm, with the people pushed farther out into the hinterland. As a result, working people (mostly men) had long commutes, which means the current generation of women grew up seeing their mothers do all the drudgery, while Dad was only there on weekends. That generation of women doesn't want to be like their mothers; they are eschewing marriage and children in favour of travel and stuff.
A non-mercantilist Japan might not have grown so quickly, but would have avoided a lot of these self-inflicted problems.
These are the Appalachia people of Japan.
But not near as fat...
Pick one up with some canned Air..
Cool, sheep dummies!!!
Surreal. I can't imagine waking up to this every day. To maintain a culture, the birthrate must be maintained at 1.2. Interesting, that the US birthrate is just around 1.2 last time I checked, which included immigration. Months after the tsunami in Japan, people were still posting pictures in town squares of personal items they found in hopes of returning them to their owners. But I don't see an orderly unwind in this country like in Japan. People in the US will steal anything not nailed down.
To maintain a culture or the population level ?
I'm not sure to understand. Because to maintain the population level it's 2.1 not 1.2 .
That does mean 1.2 children per family, right?
When you introduce demographics into the picture we see that Japan is stuck with an aging and shrinking population that is evermore expensive for the government to provide for. Adding to its woes the Fukushima nuclear disaster has shuttered its nuclear power plants and forced the country to import more expensive energy alternatives.
Japan's public debt, which stands at around 230% of its GDP and is the highest in the industrialized world. Neither monetary nor fiscal policy will adequately solve Japan's problems. Continuing to run fiscal deficits only means that government debt is pushed onward and upwards leading to a variety of possible scenarios as to the what the end game will be. Simply put, the fundamentals for Japan are lousy. More on the downward path that Japan is on in the article below.
http://brucewilds.blogspot.com/2014/05/japan-sliding-towards-abyss.html
The way I see it is the other way around. The corrupt government and stupid policies created this problem of depopulation. Not the aging and shrinking population creating problems. It is very simple. The Japanese government threw its citizens under the bus to save big banks when the massive bubble popped. If it becomes too expensive for working people to make a living, they will start having fewer children. And the situation has been made wrose, with Kuroda flooding the country with massive easy money for banksters.
Government does not provide for population. Population provides for government. Government provides for those at the top who, always and everywhere, end up controlling the government. Each of those scarecrow dolls represents a mouth that does not have to be fed. Japanese are going to be fine, but Japanese government and those who control it will have a little bit less.
And, of course, if government really wanted to provide for an aging population, what it would NOT do is steal their savings by creating massive inflation. Clearly, the Japanese government's attitude toward its elderly is, "thank you for working all your lives to keep us rich, and now please go starve to death".
Mouse utopia. It's the best analogy for Japan I have come across and it appears to be becoming more true by the day. Tell me you disagree.
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Behavioral_sink
http://youtu.be/0Z760XNy4VM
"A few weeks ago it was revealed that the mystery person behind the latest bout of monetary (if not so much fiscal) insanity in Japan is none other than Paul Krugman, a fact which has since assured the fate of Japan as a failed state: the demographically imploding country now has at best a few years (if not less) before it implodes into a hyperinflationary supernova."
Ahhhhh, Krugman, the face of progressive death for millions.
Progressives will never stop their murder spree.....it's what they do.
Grimaldus
"By drawing in younger new residents and encouraging businesses that cater to them, like an organic foods pizza parlor and a gelateria,"
Glad to see the US isn't the only country suffering with a young generation of effeminate crypto-yuppy-cum-hipsters.
Japan has had macrobiotics for longer than anyone knows. But macrobiotics isn't effiminate. It's a strict diet. Healthy, though, and it will take extra weight off.
Macrobiotics? Are you drunk?
I don't mean yeast, although there is some yeast in a macrobiotic diet.
Yeah, it's pretty clear you responded to the wrong comment. Neither "yeast" not "macrobiotic" is an appropriate response to my comment.
Mastersnark,
I enjoyed your joke.
Perhaps what I should have posted is this:
Speaking of organic Japanese restaurants, macrobiotics is a historical ultra-organic Japanese diet which sick people go on to get rid of all the toxins. Macrobiotic cooking also takes a lot of hard work.
(Facts.)
Hard work cures effeminacy.
(The setup.)
So young Japanese who are effeminate could take the author's advice and open an organic restaurant, but make it a MACROBIOTIC organic restaurant, and then the hard cooking work will cure them of their effeminacy.
(The joke.)
How bout a little fire scarecrow?
this is caveman shit, if your tribe does not have kids , your tribe dies
But how many caveman tribes had 87-million people? Again, I think the Japanese will be fine. In fact, I think it would be wonderful if Japanese population slowly declined to a point at which there were 7.38-acres per Japanese person, as there is in the USA. I think Japanese people have put up too long with too little, and too little is what you get when crowd in too many people.
There are towns like that in my state, and of the remaining residents many are meth addicts.
Kansas? There are towns there that will give away free land to anyone willing to build and live there.
What is it with the Japanese and dolls?
The Japanese really get into art, of many forms, and get "weirder" with it in many ways than post-Puritan Americans. Also, in such a crowded society, there have to be many constraints on personal behavior, and people therefore need more outlets for their imagination. There is little constraint on dolls, with which one can let one's imagination wander almost anywhere, which is perhaps why kids love dolls. Peter Pan, Mary Poppins, hobbits, Pecos Bill, Superman are like dolls - except they are in books or video.
Another tidbit: pre-Colombian Peruvians had some stuffed dolls they called "grave dolls" which they made to put in the grave with the dead, to keep them company. Pretty cool dolls.
Thanks, that explanation does make sense. :-)
FIAT WILL DESTROY YOUR WORLD !
they go first, but you will be next
brought to you by scumbag BANKERS !
"A few weeks ago it was revealed that the mystery person behind the latest bout of monetary (if not so much fiscal) insanity in Japan is none other than Paul Krugman, a fact which has since assured the fate of Japan as a failed state: the demographically imploding country now has at best a few years (if not less) before it implodes into a hyperinflationary supernova"
protocol #22 Give bad advice to governments and everyone else
In the AP article they do nothing to try and determine the cause of depopulation. Like its a big mystery.
Who knew?! Maybe if we pay more taxes to support 'rural re-investment' initiatives, then the problem will be fixed!
As if deflation is an un-utterable term.
Also they appear to not understand that the population is growing old in the entire nation, it is not a rural problem specifically. People left rural communities for the large cities and so of course these small towns were empited out.
Affluence, economic lethargy, long term deflation = aging population & lack of replacement, so basically a slow-motion collapse impeded by monetary easing and cheap energy.
So now cheap energy is disappearing - with nuclear plants shut down, oil prices too expensive to afford, shale gas BS boom blowing up (well I guess there is always coal, but its not good for everything)- and monetary easing is wearing thin as a result.
Time for a fast-motion collapse?
What culture? And are you a proponent/member of that ’culture’ (=if yes, must be an intellectual inferior culture)?
I'm glad I'm not the only one who has noticed. Any site that is anti-government which tries to share information , now has the message boards overpowered by a bunch of racists comments. You cant have a decent discussion without trolls interjecting a bunch of racist bullshit. I learned so much from this site over the years and even more by the people who would discuss and share opinions in the comment section. It has gotten truly sad. When TSHTF some of these people need to get lead poisoning.
The construction and content of this message fits a template of others I've seen recently. It is pro government and tut-tuts anyone who questions how well we have it now, and then claims that those who disparage our wonderful lives through wonderful government are racists. I can be wrong, but I would guess that some overseas lefty boiler room has begun pumping out these comments.
Considering the piece itself, ten thousand empty towns seems like a lot of empty towns, and I wonder if this is a typo. Assuming it is not, I want to thank whomever put this informative piece together. It is a real eye opener.
Maybe, for some people, it beats playing computer solitaire at work.
What would do expect from a nation that go in westernization, feminism (women right and vote), going godless, refined traditional culture getting crushed by the American one, debt, spending like no tomorrow ?
There is a reason that Mishima killed himself: he foresaw the disastrous effect of westernization that will do on his country.
Coming, to countries near you.
Meiji Restoration was the beginning of the end, 1947 was the final blow. Enjoy the decline, Gentlemen !
Maybe one day they will correct everything, but I'm skeptical: don't expect anything from millennials (disclaimer: I'm a millennial).
Obama: looks at the wonderful things we've done in Detroit.
The US federal Reeserve (Including Krugman) is guiding Japan into becoming Japan's version of Detroit.
Japan has a land area of just 145,925 square miles.
The USA has a land area of 3,805.927 square miles.
When Japan's population was 128-million, each person had 0.73 acres of land to support him.
If Japan drops to a population of 87-million, each person will have 1.07 acres of land to support him.
In the USA, at a population of 330-million, each person currently has 7.38 acres of land to support him.
Japanese people will be better off with 1.07-acres each than they were with 0.73-acres each. The handful of ultra-rich Japanese families who control the electrical power monopolies, etc., might not be better off, with only 87-million customers instead of 128-million customers.
You have to be careful with numbers. A lot of the land area in the USA isn't fit for life - deserts, tundra, steep mountains, etc. Until Fukushima, Japan didn't have such extensive uninhabitable areas.
I am in New Jersey which has a population density very much like Japan. It's too damn crowded here but there are extensive areas of land set aside (by the state and local government) for non-habitation. Also there are cultural issues that makes the crowds infuriating.
Yes, thank you for the good reminder. And yes Japan does not have deserts or tundra. But it does have steep lands, and is dense enough that people, having filled up the easy-to-farm river bottoms, have undergone the harder work of terracing marginal steep hills in many places. I can't think of many places that is done in the USA. Wineries in California, Oregon, and Washington. In Appalachia, family plots for corn and such, plus a little cash-crop tobacco (although tobacco takes so much out of the soil in so few years that I think it's hard to justify the work of terracing to create a field for it).
Also, Japan, just because it is so small, has to import various important minerals, at high cost.
So, my math may be only "conceptual" on this, but I still end up feeling that Japan could be a bit overcrowded, agriculturally.
So as long as Japan doesn't screw up the fish supply.... OH NO! FUKUSHIMA! A mega-crime.
At least New Jerseyans seem to be able to laugh at themselves, though. Waddayagunnadoo? :-)
thanks for this story
beautiful country
I have traveled a lot in the countryside and coastlands
even in 91 there were lots of empty houses in some pretty amazing places
even ocean view places
when the money falls I hope they can go back and survive
lots of rain in this lush climate, not much flat land, 85% mountainous
This article and the shadenfreude trumpeting of ZH is nonsense. The biggest problem of Japan and of the world generally, is TOO MANY PEOPLE. Japan is progressive and is slowly becoming a better country. They got too many people during war preparations of a 100 years ago. Dont have all the free food/govt support, bread and circuses jobless population that the elite have to deal with in North America. I would much rather be in Japan than in N America when the elite decide to take care of "their" problem of too many non-producing mouths to feed. Anyone ready for civil strife?
I wonder who are going to pay for the 4/10 elders to young ratio. You know Social Security, pension retirement, health-care and all that shit.
you figured it out. japan is the first real post industrial society. human population has always coincided with the means of production of food(and sanitation thanks to the black plague). the industrial age disconnected people from the direct production of their own food to a proxy while they moved to the factories to mass produce clothes, in the beginning, and now all sorts of useless stuff. this useless stuff indicates an oversupply of labor.ultimately the industrial revolution, by definition, means the elimination of labor s a function of increased productivity. there was some touted news about how manufacturing was returning to the usa, AAPL, i think, but upon inspection the entire site was being prepped by robot heavy equipment and the building was to be built by other robots, including the plumbing. site prep was handled by three guys on computers. where are the heavy equipment operators going to do for work? and what are they going to buy with their new purchasing power from their jobs at walmart? and how does APPL think they are going to sell shit to people who have no money?
the end game is natural depopulation. nature has always gotten rid of excess stuff when they overreach their boundaries. humans are no different. this story is about japan but this same story can be told in the usa. go to any small town and you will see the same discriptions(human scarecrows is a quintessentially japanese brain blast)and stories. japan is just first to the latter stage when the population will rapidly decline(-3mil/year soon) to whatever equilibrium nature has in store.
ironically, in order to maintain the regime in close to the current form, production has to be more labor intensive and babies have to be assets and not financial liabilities. that means a return to an agrarian society or a ten hour work week with extremely high pay for not so much production.
Looks like a scarecrow tax would be a real revenue generator for that local prefecture.
I bet someone in Japan is already working on some horror movies in which the scarecrow dolls come and start doing scary things.
I find it ironic how Japan was brought into the new age, after WWII, with the help of an American, W. Edwards Deming ... and Japan is now being destroyed with the guidance of another American, Paul Krugman.
Although, I have to tell you that it is difficult to think of Krugman as an American or even part of the same species which we attribute to humanity.
Krugman and Gruber .. what do these parasites have in common?
It's the Blacks' fault!
It's the Jews' fault!
It's the progressives' fault!
It's the banksters' fault!
It's Obama's fault!
You forgot Bush
More plush toys.
They're printing people!
That was my thought too. We have trillions in fake money, so why not make some fake people? The depopulation fans probably look at Japan as a success!
Well. That place is super creepy. No one is going to move out there now.
You know, earlier in the century, they used to shoot anyone not japanese looking reaching their shores. Ya think that may be a reason why your population is imploding ? There's open borders, then, well, there's Japan.
At least they can make a new kind of tourism: Urban exploration (Ghost town exploration) or in Japanese Haikyo:
http://www.haikyo.org/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Urban_exploration
https://www.google.fr/search?q=%E5%BB%83%E8%99%9A&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ei=pzCHVOurJIPmavTygdgF&ved=0CAgQ_AUoAQ&biw=1067&bih=740
The Japanese are, to me, a strange people and Japan is seemingly heading towards some type of economic collapse sooner rather than
later. However, that, in turn, will trigger deeply meaningful social and political change. What those changes will be no one exactly
knows. That being said, if I had to bet on either the Japanese or English still being around 300 years from now, my
money would be on the Japs.
In addition, IMHO, Sony make excellent audio products, as do Pioneer.
" the demographically imploding country" I accept the fiscal madness that is Japan 2014. But I am really getting upset by the constant reference to Japan as imploding because it's population is declining back to a much more appropriate size for the tiny Islands. They were never meant to hold 100 million plus people, Japan went to war in 1894-5 against China, in 1904-5 against Russia, WWI, and post war invasions of both Korea and China and WWII. All these were resource wars. Read the Japanese history of how and why war was chosen as their best option. It was for resources their growing population needed to survive on the tiny Japanese Islands.
What is happening now is a population adjustment back to reasonable sustainable levels. In 100 years the Japanese will be smaller in population, richer in land, richer in resources, richer in farmland, richer in natural areas, richer in space!
Here is the idea that really pisses Jack Burton off! "The very idea that Capitalism in 2014 can only survive and function in a growing population scenario." That free markets only work in growing populations, that industry can only happen in growing populations. Think about that idea! It is proper bull shit if ever I heard it. Capitalism adjusts to populations, the free choices of people and business will quickly adapt to a shrinking population. And the idea that a growing population is needed to fund the retirements of the old is also crap. Since when do modern Japanese retire before 80? The system can adapt and fund old folks, if the old folks play ball with expectations.
If, I am wrong. And Capitalism must exist inside a growing net population in order to function, then something is wrong with the type of capitalism being practiced. I suggest crony and finance centered capitalism is THE PROBLEM. not the population decline. Real markets adapt and adjust just like Europe did after the great die off in the mid 1300's, it came out the other side with higher wages, more land for each farmer, etc. etc. But I will admit, the ponizi bankers lost their asses in 1300's crash. Because they played ponzi scheme financial engineering games.
Japan will suffer a crisis because it is not practicing capitalism that can adjust to new circumstances that would benefit the new Japan of 50 years from now. When labor has more value, and land is cheap, housing is affordable because there is plenty of it. The lossers are financial engineers, bankers and ponzi schemes. I suggest Japan throw out the financiers, and return to real agricultural and industrial capitalism with ultra free markets. I dare say FREE MARKETS can and will adapt and produce a much higher quality of life for a Japan of say 70 million people.
Lastly, it is government and finance that demands growing populations, because those two produce nothing except ponzis and financial bubbles, attemting to live by skimming a growing population to pass wealth to the few. Japan's only problem is not enough "real free market." I suggest I am right in this, because I read history, and there is never any good reason an overpopulated Japan can't be a better place with smaller population if the market rules. I say the same for the British Isles. They are trying to cure their financial ponzi bubbles by increasing net population, the UK will soon have more people than any European nation. This is a fucking disaster! Go see what the UK is now, and imagine packing another 10 million immigrants into that place, fucking nightmare. Kick the ponzi schemers out, the financial engineers and bankers, they are the one's who must have a growing net popualtion, not the real economy!
Jack thank you very much for your excellent comment. Please write an article for circulation. The psychopathic financiers seem to control the media, including ZH and we need more voices of reason. I note that the Japanese have gone through many currency collapses before yet psychopath pundits are acting like this is the end of the world for Japan. Nothing could be further from the truth.
this time IS different, Jack.
Reducing child mortality along with extending life expectancy produces population growth.
Reduced child mortality also produces reduced total fertility rate.
On a long enough timeline the survival rate for everyone drops to zero :)
A total fertility rate of less than 2 is not sustainable and will cause the population to die out.
It's not economics Jack, it's maths.
Jack, thank you. You nailed it. The bankers and government would have us go forth and procreate until we destroy the planet.
Tylers,
The Terminal Collapse bit is too sensational. Population's still running at the low 120 Millions; and JPNs predict it to drop to the 80s in a few decades. Considering that the present situation is due to a "Postwar Reconstruction/Population-Economic Boom" which started after WWII when it lost a Generation of Single Men, it is obvious to the most casual observer that a population spike of such magnitudes should occur.
Most rual locations are being abandoned for the Cities - due to the conveniences, lack of interest in Farming for a living, and for Career Opportunities for Women.
Also, JPN-CHN Trade is larger than JPN-USA Trade for years now and growing. TWN/HKG/SGP/KOR/USA benefitted from the Senkaku Tirade (kicked off by the TWNese since they didn't like JPN-CHN's announcement of Dedollarizing Trade with their own Currencies (which makes their middleman role obsolete)).
No collapse. The Vassals of the USA and the SocialSpendingSpreeLefties will probably get ousted from the Diet in due time.
well, I guess we will see
In the meantime
There is economic opportunity for some one willing to go over there and go thru those abandoned towns
Before I left Japan in 77 I traveled around a lot and found lots of Tansu, Japanese antique cabinets, Habachi's and beautiful ceramics just laying around. Of course you need to ask permisiion if there is any one still around
If you have some money to do that it would be quite a fun job.
I just don't see the recognition of the comparative lack of economic opportunity in the countryside; people move to cities for more reason than that's where the movie theaters are.
Power; economic benefits, infrastructure improvements (roads, electricity, connectivity), government expenses. Sams as that big sucking sound coming out of DC; the money & goes there, people follow.
China has ghost cities in desperate need of scarecrow. You make for them, you get very very rich.