Parties vow measures to tackle falling birth rate

Japan Times

5 days ago

As Japan continues to face a declining birth rate, political parties are pledging to adopt measures aimed at reducing the burden on households with children in their campaigns for Sunday's House of Councilors election.
Last year, Japan recorded fewer than 700,000 births for the first time. While parties are promising to make it easier to have and raise children, they have not adequately discussed how to fund these initiatives.
In 2023, the government drew up the Children's Future Strategy, positioning the period until the 2030s, when the country's youth population is forecast to plunge, as the "last chance to reverse the declining birth rate."
Under the strategy, the government vowed to accelerate measures such as expanding child allowances, making university tuition free for households with multiple children and opening nursery services to all infants, regardless of their parents' employment status.
The number of births in 2024, announced last month, stood at 686,061, down 40,000 from the previous year. The total fertility rate, or the average number of children a woman is expected to have in her lifetime, hit a new record low of 1.15.
"It's quite difficult to achieve a V-shaped recovery in the number of births," a government official said. "We should first slow down the pace of decline."
During their election campaigns, the ruling Liberal Democratic Party and its coalition partner, Komeito, promised to promote the measures outlined in the strategy. They also pledged to work on making high school education free, which was included in a policy agreement between the two parties and Nippon Ishin no Kai.
Meanwhile, opposition parties have proposed more generous measures than those in the government's strategy.
Regarding child allowances, the main opposition Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan (CDP) and the Democratic Party for the People (DPP) plan to pay ¥15,000 ($101) per month until children turn 18. Reiwa Shinsengumi offers ¥30,000 per month until children graduate high school, while Sanseito proposes ¥100,000 per month until the age of 15.
Additionally, the CDP, Nippon Ishin and the DPP have promised to provide free early childhood education for children up to 2 years old.
The CDP has proposed eliminating tuition for national universities and reducing tuition for private universities. The Japanese Communist Party has said it wants to first halve tuition before eventually making it free.
Many parties also vowed to provide free school meals.
While the ruling and opposition parties agree on expanding child-related measures, they are divided on how to finance such measures. The government plans to fund the measures in the strategy by introducing a surcharge on public health insurance premiums starting in fiscal 2026. However, the CDP and the DPP are opposing the move.
The CDP plans to finance the measures with dividend incomes from exchange-traded funds owned by the Bank of Japan, while the DPP proposes issuing government bonds. But the government and ruling parties doubt that these would be stable funding sources.
Some social media users have criticized the surcharge as a "tax on single people," arguing that those who do not have children do not benefit from the system.
Junko Mihara, minister for children-related policies, refuted such views, saying: "Children will bear the burden of social security in the future. All generations will enjoy the benefits, so it's a mistake to call it a tax on single people."
Parties have avoided discussing the issue of funding in detail because it could sound painful. But if they continue to kick the can down the road, it may accelerate the decline in the country's birth rate.