Less Than 40% of Japanese Want to Have Children: New Poll on Declining Birthrate
Published on January 21, 2025
In its latest survey on Japan’s declining birthrate, The Nippon Foundation polled 6,000 males and females aged 15 to 45 across the country from September 26 to 30, 2024.
The issue is of growing concern, as the number of babies born in Japan, which has been declining sharply for many years, hit another record low of 727,277 in 2023, according to the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare.
The government has stepped up its efforts to encourage young people to marry and start families, with the launch of the Children and Families Agency in April 2023, a new government agency that focuses specifically on this issue and provides more support and subsidies for childbirth, children and families.
But the results of the new survey seemed to indicate once again how hard it would be for the Japanese government to reverse the downward trend in the nation’s fertility rate.
When 3,935 single men and women were asked if they intend to get married, less than half (45.9%) said yes, a third (33.4%) said no and 20.8% said they didn’t know.
But asked whether they realistically expected to get married, only 27.4% thought they would, 11 percentage points lower than those who thought they would not (38.5%). The remaining 34.1% said they didn’t know.
When the 1,313 people who didn’t intend to get married were asked why, the top reason was that they “prefer to be single” (40.1%), followed by “can’t see any benefits” (32.9%), “want to prioritize my own life” (29.1%), “worry about living with someone else” (27.1%), “having a family is a heavy burden” (26.4%), “financial concerns” (24.9%), “finding a partner takes too much effort” (20.3%), and “not interested in the opposite sex” (15.9%).
The top three reasons given by the 267 people who said they intended to get married but didn’t think they would were “no chance of meeting someone” (49.1%), “can’t get along with the opposite sex” (47.9%), and “not confident financially” (44.9%). Another main reason was “freedom and comfortableness are a priority” (27.7%).
When the 4,431 childless respondents were asked whether they either wanted to have children or felt having them was necessary, they were almost equally divided, with 37.2% saying yes and 35.7% saying no, with 27.1% saying they don’t know.
When the 1,650 men and women who said they wanted children were asked about the ideal number, more than half (58.1%) said two, followed by one (25.3%) and three or more (16.7%).
But when asked how many children they could realistically expect to have, the number who said two fell to 42.0%, those who said one increased to 37.5% and those who said three or more declined to just 4.8%.
When asked why they expected to have fewer children than they wanted, the biggest reason was the financial burden of childcare and educational expenses (39.8%), followed by low salaries (26.7%), lack of confidence in childbirth and childcare (23.8%), and difficulties in balancing work and childcare (20.0%).
When the 1,580 respondents who said they either didn’t want children or didn’t feel having children was necessary were asked why, 42.8% cited the “major financial burden”, followed by “wanting to prioritize free time” (37.2%), “lack of confidence about giving birth and raising children” (35.4%), “stress from disciplining children” (35.4%), “lack of current financial resources” (28.2%), “don’t like children” (25.4%) ,“concerns about the child growing up healthy” (21.5%), and “concerns about the future of society” (19.9%).
The 314 respondents who selected “concerns about the future of society” as a reason for not wanting children were asked what their specific concerns were. Almost two thirds cited “economic downturn and collapse of healthcare/pension systems ” (64.6%), followed by “a decline in the labor force due to the shrinking population” (56.4%), “a decrease in economic competitiveness” (48.4%), and “shortage of food and energy resources (39.8%).
From these responses we can see a vicious circle in which concerns about the falling population leading to economic and social downturn seem to encourage further population decline.
To end this blogpost on a less gloomy note, when the 1,650 people who wanted to have children were asked why, almost half (49.9%) said “to experience the joys of raising children.” This was by far the most common reason given, followed by “to support society in the future” (21.8%), “to meet the expectations of parents and relatives” (17.3%), “to continue the family line” (16.4%), “to feel secure in old age” (16.3%), “partner wants children” (16.2%), and “responsibility as a member of society” (15.0%).