And so it begins…

It's now official: Japan's population has begun to fall. Demographics has now been catapaulted into a major political issue, but seemingly from the point of view of managing public sector costs and pension structures. Other related aspects, like social conditions that encourage greater fertility (if this is even desirable- it's an open question), and whether to "top-up" population decreases with immigrants seems to be off the agenda for the moment. It starts in Japan, but we'll be seeing this come up shortly in parts of Europe, and in China.

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