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© KYODOAbe discusses Russia, Japan's low birthrate, social security in New Year statement
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© KYODO
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GW
Wow, THAT is a LOT of very HOT AIR!!!
Sounds pretty empty to me sadly, but lets have a good 2019 despite abe & the ldp!
RationalReader
Unfortunately too little too late on the birthrate. Maybe if they had doe this 20 years ago......
Ricky Kaminski13
The lost decades and missed opportunities of the Heisei era. Here’s truely hoping they can close the door on muddled thinking, empty rhetoric and ‘much of the sameness’ style mediocrity. There is so much potential here, if only it could be properly tapped
Good place to start.
New year, new era, new chance.
Strangerland
They've been talking about the birthrate since I arrived 20 years ago.
Do the hustle
The falling birthrate rate is not a ministerial problem. It is a cultural problem. Women are staying single and not having children because of the lack of marriable men. At present, around one-third of women in their thirties are single by choice and chosen careers over marriage. This is not because they are money hungry. It is because most of them have bad experiences with lazy, childish, violent bullies they had dated. How is Abe going to change the culture? Good luck with that one.
Bartholomew Harte
The Russians will Never give back the northern islands , The "Free" School program is just a bit Too Little & Too Late , & Social Security is anything but- Happy New Year !
oyatoi
“.......we will aggressively purse the resolution of Japan's postwar diplomatic concerns,"
Cheque book diplomacy time again!
kurisupisu
Japanese aren’t having kids because wages are crap and residences are on average 2-3 rooms-what is there to discuss?
gokai_wo_maneku
OK, the birthrate problem will never be understood by Abe and his men, and will never be solved. People can't afford to have children.
chugmagaga
Raising up kids in Japan still have huge problems that will not be solved by free pre-school. There is no system to give relief to parents, services as basic as baby sitting don't exist or are too expensive. This is a cultural thing. Help to mothers with household chors also don't exist. Similarly parental leaves for fathers mostly exists in documents and are not easy to avail. There are too many other things to list. I would say changing culture and mindset is as important as investing in the system.
Brian Wheway
The chance of getting those two islands back from Russia? non to zero in my option. dropping birth rate, well there is a whole lot of reasons for that, and most are mentioned in the above comments, to start this reduce the silly amount of time that people spend at work. But when you offer Free this and free that, the money has to come from some where, and that's tax's. A better and more productive pledge would be to stamp out corruption especially in the government make it a more transparent organisation, then people would have more respect and trust in the government
browny1
Abe's pledges have been trotted out repeatedly, repeatedly, repeatedly as if he and his chums believe there is some "magic" in his words.
Almost all of the current ailments facing Japan have in some way or another been under the watch of LDP. No debate about it - they have.
Nothing has been done to address these problems over the years, save for "lip service", just as is happening again now.
You'd think an electorate of an advanced country would have cottoned onto this by now, and be vigorously challenging the govt for more action and less words.
Hollow ramblings together with 21C trinkets and mirrors, still seem to have the power of eras long gone by.
1glenn
Globally, the population explosion is a disaster. That Japan has a stable population is to be applauded, not lauded.
As for trying to get land back from the Russians, best of luck, but don't hold your breath. It will be a long time before they forget the war of 1905.
browny1
1glenn - there's no reason to applaud Japan's stable (falling actually) population as there has been no design or careful intent to this at all.
No one decided that Japan should reduce it's population. It is reducing because of demographic problems inherent in a lack-of-long-term-vision-and-strategies by the perennial incumbents.
In a rapidly expanding global population, stability has merits, but in Japan's case it's just by default.
And because of this, it is the ordinary good citizens of Japan who have to bear the consequences of the dreaded "Inverted Demographic Pyramid".
buzzyboy
Remembering my time in Yokohama, Tokyo, and Kawasaki, as a single male in a "large" apartment...how could a couple and 2-3 kids ever endure? Is this possibly related to family crime statistics?
buzzyboy
These problems will never ever ever be solved. Ever. I will see Elon Musk trotting around Mars in a spacesuit...hell, I will see Mars terraformed! , before I see the LDP do anything constructive about these issues, and before the Kuriles are Japanese again!!!!
Akie
An open Japan must be an adaptive Japan, a sovereign Japan. Future generations must have their own rights to make their own decisions.