Japan Looking to France for Ideas for Increasing Fertility Rate

As reported here the other day, Japan’s population is still on the decrease, and its fertility rate is a very low 1.37 babies per woman. It is generally believed that a birth rate of about 2.11 is required to maintain a stable population, but Japan is very far from this level. The government has talked for years about what to do about the issue, but despite a certain stabilization in recent years, the birth rate remains very low.

Japan Today has a story today about the government’s plan to look to France for ideas. According to the story, the minister in charge of the declining birthrate, Fukushima Mizuho is looking at various measures that have been implemented in France, including the establishment of a fund to provide money to support housing, childcare and other services for children. The French fund, which is 45% sponsored by private industry, has paid out some 9 trillion yen worth of benefits to families in 2008.

This, among other ideas, marks another big increase in welfare spending, which will place an even larger burden on tax payers. Its little wonder that the self-avowed Socialist and leader of the Socialist Democratic Party of Japan, Fukushima, has turned first to a country such as France for ideas in her field of policy responsibility. The argument goes that France has one of the best fertility rates in Europe, with a rate of 2.02, and therefore it is advisable to try to emulate their policies.

There is a problem with this however. It happens that the link between the high fertility rate and the high degree of welfare payments is not as clear as many ideologues would like us to believe. There is at least as strong a link between the high fertility rate and the rate of immigration. Immigration into Europe is relatively high, and most immigrants come from developing nations, and Muslim countries, where the fertility rate is much higher than in more developed countries. Indeed, while the fertility rate of French born citizens is 1.8, the fertility rate, for example, among Muslims in France is 4 times higher, at 8.1. The Muslim population in France makes up 6-10% of the total population (it is impossible to be clearer than this, because France does not allow the collection of statistics based on ethnicity!), which means that this, along with the effect of other immigrants from developing countries (at least 65-70% of total immigration) has a significant effect on the overall fertility rate in France.

The idea that paying people more money will make them have more babies may sound like a nice idea, but I would argue that it isn’t even that. While there may be many people that put off adding to their family due to financial constraints, there are also a great number that take advantage of welfare systems, when they are available, by having children that they may not otherwise want. Especially when such welfare systems allow them to get by without the need to work very hard. Portions of predominantly black communities in urban areas of the US are a case in point, where fathers are no longer needed to provide for families, because of the role that government now plays in providing support. This is not a road that Japan wants to continue down.

I maintain that the best way to build stronger, larger families is to leave more of the decisions to the individual families, and not less. By leaving more money in the pocket book for middle class families, and getting the government out of the way of competition and regional sovereignty in education and other areas that have such high costs for families, people will tend towards having more children – when they are ready for them. Having the government throw more money at the problem has never been known to solve anything – and I am highly skeptical of any so-called evidence in France to the contrary. In Japan, there needs to be further deregulation of education systems (including making it unnecessary for everyone to have to purchase the same expensive uniforms and bags etc), pro-growth economic policies that increase overall disposable income, and then a return by society as a whole to the things that are really important – their families. Some of these things just can’t be legislated away, and the government shouldn’t be trying. Its time that people stopped looking to the government for all of the solutions, and did a little more looking inside of their own priorities…. This would of course be a lot easier, if the government wasn’t already involved in so many aspects of our lives….

Tags: Birth Rates, Fertility Rates, French Welfare System, Fukushima Mizuho, Immigration, SDP, taxes, Welfare