Japan's demography 日本的人口
Japan's demography 日本的人口
The incredible shrinking country 一个不可思议地萎缩的国家
http://www.economist.com/blogs/banyan/2014/03/japans-demography
Mar 25th 2014, 12:55by D.M. | TOKYO
A QUIET but constant ticking can be heard from the demographic time bomb that sits beneath the world’s third-largest economy. This week it made a louder tick than usual: official statistics show that the population declined last year by a record 244,000 people—roughly the population of the London borough of Hackney.
安静而又永恒的滴答声可以从埋藏在这个世界第三大经济体下的人口定时炸弹这里听到。这个星期这个滴答声比往常更大了一点：官方统计显示日本的人口在去年打破纪录减少了24.4万人，大致相当于伦敦哈克尼区的人口。
Japan's population began falling in 2004 and is now ageing faster than any other on the planet. More than 22% of Japanese are already 65 or older. A report compiled with the government’s co-operation two years ago warned that by 2060 the number of Japanese will have fallen from 127m to about 87m, of whom almost 40% will be 65 or older.
日本的人口从2004年开始下降，并且现在比地球上任何一个民族都更快的步入老年化。超过22%的日本人已经是65岁或者更老。一份两年前由政府合作编辑成的报告警告在2060年日本人的数量将会从1.27亿人下降到8700万人，其中几乎40%的人是65岁以上。
The government is pointedly not denying newspaper reports that ran earlier this month, claiming that it is considering a solution it has so far shunned: mass immigration. The reports say the figure being mooted is 200,000 foreigners a year. An advisory body to Shinzo Abe, the prime minister, said opening the immigration drawbridge to that number would help stabilise Japan’s population—at around 100m (from its current 126.7m).
政府尖锐地并不否定这个月早些时候报纸的报道，宣称政府正在考虑之前一直避开的解决办法：大量移民。这个报道说模拟的数据是每年20万外国人。总理安倍晋三的顾问团说放移民的限制到这个数量可以帮助稳定日本的人口 ---- 在大概1亿 （从现在的1.267亿）。
But even then there’s a big catch. To hit that target the government would also have to raise the fertility rate from its current 1.39, one of the lowest in the world, up to 2.07. Experts say that a change on that scale would require major surgery to the country’s entire social architecture. One of the first things Japan would need to do, says Kathy Matsui, chief Japan equity strategist at Goldman Sachs in Tokyo, is make it easier for mothers to work. “Evidence shows that work-forces with a higher female participation rate also have higher birth rates,” she says.
但即使是这样，还是有一个很大的距离。为了达到这个目标政府还必须要把人口出生率从现在的世界最低国家之一的1.39提高到2.07.专家们分析这一比例的改变会要求国家的整体社会结构都进行一次大手术。日本首先需要做的，东京高盛的首席日本产权战略家凯西.松井说，是创造条件让妈妈们更容易去工作。“证据显示劳动人口中女性参与比例越高，出生率就会越高。”她说。
Mr Abe has invoked Ms Matsui in his quest to boost the birth rate. Progress towards bringing women into the labour force is far from assured however. The latest Gender Gap Report, compiled annually by the Davos-based World Economic Forum, ranked Japan 105 out of 136 countries, down 25 places from 2006. (South Korea—another country with a fertility crisis—does even worse, coming in at 111th place.)
安倍已经在他促进出生率的探索中任用了松井女士。然而，把妇女带回到劳动力市场的进展跟保证做到还有很远的距离。由瑞士达沃斯世界经济论坛编辑的最新的性别差异报告显示，日本在136个国家中排名105，相比于2006年下降了25位。（南韩 --- 另外一个有出生率危机的国家 ---- 更加糟糕，排在第111位）
The looming crisis has so alarmed Japan’s government that in 2005 it created a ministerial post to raise fertility. Last year a 20-member panel under the ministry produced a desperate wish list to reduce what it calls “deterrents” to marriage and child rearing. It included a proposal to assign gynaecologists to patients on a lifelong basis and even to provide financial support for unmarried Japanese who undertake "spouse-hunting" projects.
这个日益逼近的危机使到日本政府如此的恐慌，以至于在2005年时创立了一个部长职务以提升出生率。去年，这个部门20名成员的委员会制定了一个孤注一掷的希望清单，以减少它所谓的结婚与育儿的“障碍物”。它包含建议委派妇科医生给产妇的终身，甚至为那些愿意参加“寻找伴侣”项目的未结婚的日本人提供金钱上的援助。
Immigration is being approached as a last resort. Even so the prime minister faces tough choices. The United Nations estimates that without raising its fertility rate, Japan would need to attract about 650,000 immigrants a year. There is no precedent for that level of immigration in this country, which is still a largely homogenous society.
移民是作为万不得已的方法。即使这样，首相面临着艰难的选择。联合国预计，如果提升不了本国的出生率，日本将需要吸引大概65万移民一年。而这个移民的水平在日本是史无前例的，日本现在还是一个非常同质化的社会。
Roughly 2% of Japan’s population is foreign. And even this figure includes large numbers of permanent residents—mostly Chinese and Koreans—who have been here for generations. Tellingly, the recent story about the government’s discussion of immigration broke in the right-wing Sankei newspaper (in Japanese), which is especially unlikely to embrace the idea of a Chinese family living on every Japanese street.
大概2%的日本人口是外国人。而即使是这个数字也已经包含了很大一部份永久居民 ---- 大部份是中国人和韩国人 ---- 他们已经在这里生活了好几代人了。显著地，最近在日本产经新闻报有一则消息表示政府关于移民的讨论由于右翼的反对而失败了，右翼特别的不喜欢接纳让中国家庭生活在日本的每条街上这个观点。
Japan’s demographic dilemma grows more urgent by the year. Last week the government passed the nation’s largest-ever budget—a mammoth $937-billion package swelled by welfare and pension spending. Japan is already weighed down by one of the world’s largest public debt burdens. With its inverted population pyramid, where will it find the tax base to repay this debt, and to care for its growing population of elderly?
日本人口的进退两难境地在今年愈演愈烈。上个星期政府通过了有史以来最大的预算 ---- 一笔巨大的9370亿美元由福利和养老金支出支撑起来的巨款。日本已经被成为世界上最大的公债国家之一的负担压垮了。拥有人口倒金字塔，从哪里可以寻找基于税收的收入来偿还它的债务，并且照顾它日益庞大的老年人群体？
The 2012 government report said that without policy change, by 2110 the number of Japanese could fall to 42.9m, ie just a third of its current population. It is plausible to think that the country could learn to live with its shrinking population. But that might mean also embracing a much diminished economic and political role in the world. Mr Abe would seem to be the last leader to accept that.
2012年政府报告中说，政策不改变的话，到2110年日本人的数量会掉到4290万人，仅仅是现在人口的1/3. 国家可以学习在它人口日益萎缩的时候照样生存，这种想法貌似有理。但是这可能也意味着包含经济和在世界上的政治角色的巨大削弱。安倍看起来是最后一个接受这种情况的日本领导人。
The incredible shrinking country 一个不可思议地萎缩的国家
http://www.economist.com/blogs/banyan/2014/03/japans-demography
Mar 25th 2014, 12:55by D.M. | TOKYO
A QUIET but constant ticking can be heard from the demographic time bomb that sits beneath the world’s third-largest economy. This week it made a louder tick than usual: official statistics show that the population declined last year by a record 244,000 people—roughly the population of the London borough of Hackney.
安静而又永恒的滴答声可以从埋藏在这个世界第三大经济体下的人口定时炸弹这里听到。这个星期这个滴答声比往常更大了一点：官方统计显示日本的人口在去年打破纪录减少了24.4万人，大致相当于伦敦哈克尼区的人口。
Japan's population began falling in 2004 and is now ageing faster than any other on the planet. More than 22% of Japanese are already 65 or older. A report compiled with the government’s co-operation two years ago warned that by 2060 the number of Japanese will have fallen from 127m to about 87m, of whom almost 40% will be 65 or older.
日本的人口从2004年开始下降，并且现在比地球上任何一个民族都更快的步入老年化。超过22%的日本人已经是65岁或者更老。一份两年前由政府合作编辑成的报告警告在2060年日本人的数量将会从1.27亿人下降到8700万人，其中几乎40%的人是65岁以上。
The government is pointedly not denying newspaper reports that ran earlier this month, claiming that it is considering a solution it has so far shunned: mass immigration. The reports say the figure being mooted is 200,000 foreigners a year. An advisory body to Shinzo Abe, the prime minister, said opening the immigration drawbridge to that number would help stabilise Japan’s population—at around 100m (from its current 126.7m).
政府尖锐地并不否定这个月早些时候报纸的报道，宣称政府正在考虑之前一直避开的解决办法：大量移民。这个报道说模拟的数据是每年20万外国人。总理安倍晋三的顾问团说放移民的限制到这个数量可以帮助稳定日本的人口 ---- 在大概1亿 （从现在的1.267亿）。
But even then there’s a big catch. To hit that target the government would also have to raise the fertility rate from its current 1.39, one of the lowest in the world, up to 2.07. Experts say that a change on that scale would require major surgery to the country’s entire social architecture. One of the first things Japan would need to do, says Kathy Matsui, chief Japan equity strategist at Goldman Sachs in Tokyo, is make it easier for mothers to work. “Evidence shows that work-forces with a higher female participation rate also have higher birth rates,” she says.
但即使是这样，还是有一个很大的距离。为了达到这个目标政府还必须要把人口出生率从现在的世界最低国家之一的1.39提高到2.07.专家们分析这一比例的改变会要求国家的整体社会结构都进行一次大手术。日本首先需要做的，东京高盛的首席日本产权战略家凯西.松井说，是创造条件让妈妈们更容易去工作。“证据显示劳动人口中女性参与比例越高，出生率就会越高。”她说。
Mr Abe has invoked Ms Matsui in his quest to boost the birth rate. Progress towards bringing women into the labour force is far from assured however. The latest Gender Gap Report, compiled annually by the Davos-based World Economic Forum, ranked Japan 105 out of 136 countries, down 25 places from 2006. (South Korea—another country with a fertility crisis—does even worse, coming in at 111th place.)
安倍已经在他促进出生率的探索中任用了松井女士。然而，把妇女带回到劳动力市场的进展跟保证做到还有很远的距离。由瑞士达沃斯世界经济论坛编辑的最新的性别差异报告显示，日本在136个国家中排名105，相比于2006年下降了25位。（南韩 --- 另外一个有出生率危机的国家 ---- 更加糟糕，排在第111位）
The looming crisis has so alarmed Japan’s government that in 2005 it created a ministerial post to raise fertility. Last year a 20-member panel under the ministry produced a desperate wish list to reduce what it calls “deterrents” to marriage and child rearing. It included a proposal to assign gynaecologists to patients on a lifelong basis and even to provide financial support for unmarried Japanese who undertake "spouse-hunting" projects.
这个日益逼近的危机使到日本政府如此的恐慌，以至于在2005年时创立了一个部长职务以提升出生率。去年，这个部门20名成员的委员会制定了一个孤注一掷的希望清单，以减少它所谓的结婚与育儿的“障碍物”。它包含建议委派妇科医生给产妇的终身，甚至为那些愿意参加“寻找伴侣”项目的未结婚的日本人提供金钱上的援助。
Immigration is being approached as a last resort. Even so the prime minister faces tough choices. The United Nations estimates that without raising its fertility rate, Japan would need to attract about 650,000 immigrants a year. There is no precedent for that level of immigration in this country, which is still a largely homogenous society.
移民是作为万不得已的方法。即使这样，首相面临着艰难的选择。联合国预计，如果提升不了本国的出生率，日本将需要吸引大概65万移民一年。而这个移民的水平在日本是史无前例的，日本现在还是一个非常同质化的社会。
Roughly 2% of Japan’s population is foreign. And even this figure includes large numbers of permanent residents—mostly Chinese and Koreans—who have been here for generations. Tellingly, the recent story about the government’s discussion of immigration broke in the right-wing Sankei newspaper (in Japanese), which is especially unlikely to embrace the idea of a Chinese family living on every Japanese street.
大概2%的日本人口是外国人。而即使是这个数字也已经包含了很大一部份永久居民 ---- 大部份是中国人和韩国人 ---- 他们已经在这里生活了好几代人了。显著地，最近在日本产经新闻报有一则消息表示政府关于移民的讨论由于右翼的反对而失败了，右翼特别的不喜欢接纳让中国家庭生活在日本的每条街上这个观点。
Japan’s demographic dilemma grows more urgent by the year. Last week the government passed the nation’s largest-ever budget—a mammoth $937-billion package swelled by welfare and pension spending. Japan is already weighed down by one of the world’s largest public debt burdens. With its inverted population pyramid, where will it find the tax base to repay this debt, and to care for its growing population of elderly?
日本人口的进退两难境地在今年愈演愈烈。上个星期政府通过了有史以来最大的预算 ---- 一笔巨大的9370亿美元由福利和养老金支出支撑起来的巨款。日本已经被成为世界上最大的公债国家之一的负担压垮了。拥有人口倒金字塔，从哪里可以寻找基于税收的收入来偿还它的债务，并且照顾它日益庞大的老年人群体？
The 2012 government report said that without policy change, by 2110 the number of Japanese could fall to 42.9m, ie just a third of its current population. It is plausible to think that the country could learn to live with its shrinking population. But that might mean also embracing a much diminished economic and political role in the world. Mr Abe would seem to be the last leader to accept that.
2012年政府报告中说，政策不改变的话，到2110年日本人的数量会掉到4290万人，仅仅是现在人口的1/3. 国家可以学习在它人口日益萎缩的时候照样生存，这种想法貌似有理。但是这可能也意味着包含经济和在世界上的政治角色的巨大削弱。安倍看起来是最后一个接受这种情况的日本领导人。
还没人赞这篇日记