Birth Rate Increases- Inevitable Extinction of Japanese Race Prolonged

The inevitable extinction of the Japanese race has been prolonged by a few years. The average number of children a Japanese woman will have in her lifetime has gone up dramatically from 1.34 to 1.37 (2.07 is needed to keep the size of the population constant.) With deaths far out-pacing births, this results in a net annual population decrease of 51,317. According to some estimates, the world's last Japanese person born in Japan will die sometime in the middle of the next century. This news has some people worried that in order to keep the social security coffers full, Japan will have to do something nobody wants: accept immigrants- permanently. Personally I welcome the falling population rate- think of how easy it will be to find a parking spot close to the Costco entrance!

Wanna Buy a School? Jungle Gym Included!

The incredible shrinking Japanese population has led to some interesting problems. One is that because there are so few children to fill up schools, cities have been forced with unloading hundreds of shuttered public school buildings. The problem has been that finding buyers has been difficult, especially in rural areas. One city in Hokkaido, which had to close 7 of its 9 elementary schools in 2008, decided to put the properties on Yahoo Japan's auction site, which would expose the properties to a national audience. The plan worked. Final sale price for one school, compete with pool, gym and playground: $300,000.