JAPAN’S DESTINY.

Star (Christchurch), Volume LXIV, Issue 955, 27 December 1933, Page 1

JAPAN’S DESTINY.

Population Growth is the Main Problem. TOKIO, December 12. The patriots, politicians and generals who figure so vividly in the newspapers seem little more than marionettes, compared with the economic forces which are shaping Japan’s destiny. Japan's problem is how to feed the millions more mouths in the next twenty years, and to find a quarter cf a million new jobs each year. Birth control offers no solution, as the prospective workers are already born. There is no room for them on the tiny farms. After twenty years the situation will ease, as the marriage rate is diminishing and a higher standard of living results in later marriages. Competition for employment is intense. The newspapers, besieged with applications for employment, hold examinations. and reject hundreds cf applicants. Three hundred undergraduates competed for eleven places in the diplomatic and consular services, and 10,442 competed for 465 vacancies in the Army Academy. Cannot Go Back. The pressure has already been felt so much, and the people are so intoxicated with the rapid ascent in the fifty years, that their leaders rightly fear the social consequences of a setback. They also dread the effect of tariffs that will close foreign markets.