Japan running out of children? The census of 2005 was the first in which the country recorded a total fall in population from the previous year's estimated figures. Estimates for 2006 suggested a modest increase in the birthrate, but last year saw another decline. Extrapolating current trends, the United Nations Population Division forecast that the Japanese population will number about 100 million in 2050, nearly 30 million below its peak. A study by the Japanese Ministry of Health, Labor, and Welfare suggested an even greater decrease, to around 90 million, with a further fall to below 50 million by 2105. A falling birthrate and a decline in total population means, by definition, that a greater proportion of the population will be elderly. Hence, these predictions have provoked fears of a shrinking labor force, with consequent strains on the health service and pension system.

How justified are these fears? They rest, of course, on the assumption that there will be no recovery in the birthrate, an assumption that cannot be proved. Falling birthrates are a characteristic of most developed nations, but various European countries, particularly in the historically Protestant north of the continent, have recently witnessed rising fertility after a period of decline following the end of the baby boom in the 1960s. The fertility rate in Norway, for instance, fell from 2.72 births per woman in 1968-9 to a low of 1.68 births per woman in the period from 1981 to 1985. After that, it began a gradual rise to its current level of 1.90 births per woman, only slightly below the replacement rate.

Norway and other Northern European nations achieved this through policies such as making child care freely available for working parents, and offering generous provisions for maternity and paternity leave. It may be that Japan's birthrate too will recover, if its government is able to implement similar policies. In particular, the government could take steps to reduce the sheer financial cost of giving birth and raising children. In most of Europe, expectant mothers can count on the fact that their child will be delivered in hospital free of charge; by contrast, Japanese mothers must pay hundreds of thousands of yen for the cost of delivery, not all of which will necessarily be refunded by insurance. Family allowance payments could also be increased. This would potentially place another strain on government funds, but perhaps employers could be obliged to contribute to family allowance payments for their workers.

Some have suggested that Japan should follow the example of Western Europe and Anglo-Saxon nations in boosting its working-age population through mass immigration. Currently, barely 1 percent of workers in Japan are foreign, a tiny proportion compared to most Western nations. Yet the visible difficulties Western countries have had in assimilating immigrant populations may now make Japan reluctant to follow the same course. This is especially the case given the potency of Japanese national myths of racial and cultural homogeneity. Also, the countries from which immigrants have traditionally entered Japan, Korea and China, themselves now have fertility rates below replacement level, and in the future are more likely to need to accept immigrants than provide them for others.

Yet in the final analysis, one must ask how vital it is that Japan reverse the trend of a declining population. A 22nd century nation of 50 million people will still be more populous than, say, present-day Spain, a prosperous and successful country with a greater surface area than Japan. It is worth noting that Japan's current population is a historical anomaly. The total number of citizens only reached 100 million in the mid-1960s, and this was a level attained after decades of intensive growth; Japan's population was a mere 72 million at the outbreak of the Pacific War, and a century ago it numbered less than 50 million, roughly equivalent to the worst case scenario for 2105.

These statistics, of course, do not take into account the fact that the population will be aging as well as shrinking. But an aging population has its virtues. The problem of funding pensions and health care is real, but a country with a low birthrate will need to spend correspondingly less on educating its young. Moreover, if standard retirement ages were to be gradually increased in line with rising life expectancy, then the knowledge and experience of the middle-aged and elderly could be a decided asset to employers and to society as a whole.

Moreover, older populations display greater social stability, lower crime rates and a better quality of life. Most crimes are committed by the young. In a recent article in the British newspaper The Independent, columnist Daniel Finkelstein reported on the research of social scientist Gunnar Heinsohn, who suggests that youthful populations fuel violence and instability. He observes that there is currently violence in 60 out of 67 countries in the world where 15- to 29-year-olds make up more than 30 percent of the population. The most peaceful countries, by and large, are those whose citizens are predominantly middle-aged or elderly.

Perhaps, after all, Japan should be glad to be gray.