comment: >
  
  But as an ever-smaller share of the population works in agriculture, it's normal for those rural areas to lose population.  Automation is only going to improve.  And innovations like cultured meat and the rest of cellular agriculture are only going to accelerate that.  Plus Japan, like many other places, is investing in vertical farms, which are often located in or near the cities, closer to customers.  
  
  Share of the labor force employed in agriculture
  Number of people living in urban and rural areas, Japan
  Number of people living in urban and rural areas, European Union
  Number of people living in urban and rural areas, United Kingdom
  Number of people living in urban and rural areas, United States
  Number of people living in urban and rural areas, Brazil
  Number of people living in urban and rural areas, Mexico
  Number of people living in urban and rural areas, Indonesia
context: Or the Japanese govt pushes the companies to remote hire in these areas.
  How's the internet in these areas. >
  
  If it’s anything like South Korea they have dirt cheap fiber to every doorstep. And free wifi everywhere. Emphasis on to the door. It isn’t copper to the door like Verizon does. >
  
  South Korea is legendary for their internet speeds. Japan is way behind them on it. Used to be very, very far behind but it's gotten better. >
  
  I always assumed Japan would be similar. SK knocks internet, free wifi, and public transit out of the freaking park. >
  
  Or rather, to every Park. >
  
  Park sung Kim Lee >
  
  Headline is misleading. The government's motive for these measures is to stem the bleeding from rural communities.
  
  Current migration patterns are resulting in deserted hometowns with few children. In the riverside village of Nagoro in southern Japan, there were fewer than 30 residents in 2019, with the youngest resident over the age of 50. The village’s only school shut down a few years ago after its last students graduated.
  To combat these issues, authorities launched an initiative in 2019 to attract people to regional areas. >
  
  Is it misleading to show both sides of the problem? 
  
  For decades, people across Japan have migrated to its urban centers seeking job opportunities. Tokyo is the country’s most populous city, with roughly 37 million residents. 
  Before the Covid pandemic, the number of people moving into Tokyo outnumbered those leaving the city by up to 80,000 each year, according to government statistics released in 2021. 
  Meanwhile, in major cities, space has rapidly run out and prices have skyrocketed. Tokyo is consistently one of the world’s most expensive cities to live in, ranking fifth globally in 2022. >
  
  Cities are typically self-regulating, as people generally don't move to them unless they feel confident that they can get a job that covers the higher expenses.
  Rural towns get abandoned because the lower cost of living can't make up for the lack of services and amenities, and this creates a negative feedback loop as people leave, and evrn fewer services and amenities are available. You need an external force to break such a spiral, which is what government incentives hope to achieve.
  While big cities may seem like a positive feedback loop, this isn't as much of problem because it will eventually reach an equilibrium of population density. In declining negative feedback loop towns, this equilibrium is 0.
  Big cities also enjoy big economy of scale benefits. It's usually much more efficient when more people can use the same infrastructure and amenities. >
  
  The thing is, we need to be piling into cities.  People will bemoan the death of rural townships but a lot of communities only ever existed because of resources they were built around.  There are a lot of towns, and hell even some cities, which should just bite the dust.  There's absolutely no reason why we should need to have as insane a goods distribution infrastructure as we currently have.
  The problem is, media consistently glamorizes rural living, and people make a cultural thing out of it.  And they demonize city life, focusing on the worst parts. >
  
  This is an incredibly weird view, and potentially very damaging.
  Those rural communities frequently serve as important agricultural centers or distribution hubs.   They are often the source of the goods that enable cities to be so centralized.