Japan births fall to record low as population crisis deepens
I contend that across the developed world, everything just got too expensive. In the two places I ‘live’, Sydney and Tokyo, young people are putting off the usual life events such as getting married, having kids etc. because of unstable housing and insecure employment.<p>50 years ago, a dwelling was around 3-4x annual salary, now it’s 15-20x salary. You aren’t paying that off early and growing the family, even with both parents working. To even get both parents working, you need child care, which for many people costs more than one parent just staying home. Your family lives in the more established suburbs because they bought when it was affordable, so you’re miles away from them and they can’t just come around and mind the grandkids, so you’re a bit stuck.<p>Some serious consideration needs to be made about the growing trend of wealth percolating towards the older and established parts of society in a way that didn’t used to happen, personally I believe the financialisation of housing (and basically everything else, have you seen the prices of used games lately…) is a major contributor.<p>Nonetheless, this will all slowly grind to a halt as our major cities die out due to lack of young people when they&#x27;re forced out. Sydney is already becoming a retirement village, give it a few years to really set in and maybe then there will be the impetus to start fixing it.