But you’re missing the point that the population of Japan specifically is on the decline and has been for decades.

Even if we take out the cost of pensions for the elderly out of the equation, if people aren’t having kids to replace themselves, there won’t be enough working age people to fill every job needed.

For reference, the Japanese birth rate as of June 2024 was only 1.2. If that trend continues, in say 20-30 years, there will be about 1/2 of adults then as there are now.

The easiest and most immediate solution for Japan (and South Korea which is also having the same problem) would be to ease immigration so that more people can come in to work. But that doesn’t help in the long run nor does it address the cultural and societal factors that have lead to this point. And even then, since both countries are so homogenous, it would be hard for natives to accept a huge influx of immigrants.

On the one hand, yes having a child with a higher quality of life is better than having many children.

However, there’s a good Kurzgesagt video about how the severe decline in birthrate can doom a population. Basically, if a population is not at the very least replacing itself, it will run out of young workers to keep the country going and vastly skew the proportion of elderly people to young workers. Small, rural towns will not survive since young people will flock to cities for work.

Though the video is based on Korea, the same concepts apply for Japan as well.

Thanks for the tip. I had thought of doing Home Assistant to automate things like lights but I use the Echo for other stuff too (like reminders and weather). I guess I’ll just wait for the open source tech to catch up.

How disheartening. I knew going in that there would be privacy issues but I figured for the service it was fine. I also figure my phone is always listening anyway.

As someone with limited mobility, my echo has been really nice to control my smart devices like lights and TV with just my voice.

Are there good alternatives or should I just accept things as they are?

“I feel like I’m going to die, Bart”

Do you have proof of this? I tried searching but I only get articles related to this incident.