Free Essay Example on Birth Rates in Japan

Birthrate tells whether a country's population iplaces incre asing or not. A nation is made up of the human race as a pillar of its reference. Rapid increase or decline in the population should be a major concern in any economy. However much developed a country is, if the human race is declining then one day if measures are not taken to re-correct the vice, then it will be extinct. Human beings are the backbone of the economy.

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The birth rate in Japan has declined tremendously and has become a government concern. A Ministry for Measures of the Declining Birthrate has been set and a task-force to look at the causes and solutions. The problem started in the 1950s. There was a change in the social environment. The issue of a small family of not more than two started. This is a result of a change in the economic constraints. It was heightened further by the issue of contraceptives. At the time, there were as many abortions as birth. Japanese were doing abortions so has to maintain the social status of two kids. The birth rate was affected adversely. In 1973, there was the oil crisis in Japan that changed the way of a family being. It brought about the change from heavy industry to the service industry (Hara, 2014). Many jobs were created for both genders. The family set up was changed completely. The men were considered the family breadwinner and the women were the home-makers, but this changed. All of them could work and earn a personal living.

The oil issue saw Japan's economy grow gradually. Higher education for women was shooting up. Therefore, there were equal employment opportunities for both men and women. The enactment of Equal Employment Opportunity Act and other Legislation laws that gave equal rights to the two genders empowered women further. The gender roles were weakened because anyone could do any job. There was mass recruitment for jobs, and everyone got busy working. People got busy, and marriage rate went down. People had no time to get married hence the birth rate dropped. Those who got married had children, so the drop in birth rate is attributed to the unmarried guys. The issue of rate marriage came up which contributed to low birth rate since fertility rate decreases with age (Coulmas, 2011). The young guys depended on their parents who are established. Due to the two-child stand culture it put no economic and demographic pressure on the parents to feed one or two grown up kids. They depended on their mothers who were working part-time and still full-time home worker. There emerged an ideological difference between the men and ladies. The men are searching for women who can stay at home as their mothers used to and did the household chores. On the contrary, the ladies were looking for men in the economical class who could take care of their financial needs. Marriages have been delayed and subsequent low birth rate.

These issues must be solved as soon as possible otherwise Japan is likely to lose its reputation in the world. Encouraging those already in a marriage or those already having kids by providing free pre-natal and post-natal care, increased child allowances will not solve the issue. The best way is to encourage those who are not married to marry and have children. One of the ways is to create an environment for a family building. The majority of the Japanese are not married and are not willing to marry any soon (Coulmas, 2011). Youths should be taught on the needs of having a family and propagating time. This can be b made possible by balancing the working hours in a day. Let reduce the working time and increase the counseling time.

Another thing is to restructure the reproductive health and childbirth strategies. The young men and ladies should be taught on good child-rearing support. It should start from the prenatal procedures to post-natal and include up to maturity. The freshly married couple should receive intensive training on family life and how to raise children. They should be taught on how to balance home `and work. The issue of gender-based roles should be abolished. It should be a collective mission to make a family and bring up children (Coulmas, 2011). Marriage, pregnancy and childbirth should be encouraged in Japan. They should embrace reproductive health at all levels of learning. Let this training start as early as possible. The young children in lower grades of learning should be introduced to reproductive health practices. Let them keep records on their personal reproductive because this will help during treatment time. The central government, state corporation, county government and other stakeholders should join hand in the fight against this birth rate decline matter (Hara, 2014). Comprehensive policies should be put in place to ensure fertility is increased and maintained in Japan. The state should control the use of contraceptive. Due to the late marriages fertility treatment should be encouraged. The female and male eggs weaken with age.

If the Japanese people take these measures and proper and appropriate measures taken then, this issue will be history. The citizen should also take it as a national issue and change positively towards the same. Japan should reclaim its glory back otherwise if will be a falling nation.

References

Coulmas, F., & Lutzeler, R. (2011). Imploding populations in Japan and Germany: A comparison. Leiden: Brill.

Hara, T. (2014). A shrinking society: Post-demographic transition in Japan. Tokyo: Springer.