Most of Japan&#x27;s problems have nothing to do with demographics. That&#x27;s just a fraudulent cover story used to hide the keynesian disaster. Debt and incompetent public spending that has been asphyxiating the private sector through malinvestment, has been the core problem (to go with continually bailing out zombie corporations). They loaded up on both debt and public spending since ~1990, and they got negative net real GDP out of it (even while their population increased).<p>Germany by contrast has seen zero population growth over 40 years and did not have similar growth (or debt) problems of the sort that Japan created for itself. Germany&#x27;s GDP has increased nominally by 750% over those 40 years (their economy also tripled in size in the 15 years before the Berlin Wall fell, with zero population growth).<p>If demographics mattered that much, Germany&#x27;s economy would be - and would have been - a disaster like Japan&#x27;s is.