Japan population: One in 10 people now aged 80 or older

For the first time ever, more than one in 10 people in Japan are now aged 80 or older.

National data also shows 29.1% of the 125 million population is aged 65 or older- a record.

Japan has one of the lowest birth-rates in the world and has long struggled with how to provide for its aging population.

It has the world's oldest population, measured by the proportion of people aged 65 or up, the United Nations says.

As of 2022, Japan has the world's highest percentage of the population aged 65 and over, with South Korea in second place at 24.5% and Hong Kong in third at 23.6%, putting the three East Asian countries in line.

In Japan, those aged over 65 are expected to account for 34.8% of the population by 2040, according to the National Institute of Population and Social Security Research.

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The country's elderly employment rate is among the highest across major economies - workers aged 65 or more make up more than 13% of the national workforce.

But this has done little to relieve the burden on the country's social security spending.

Japan has approved a record budget for the next fiscal year, in part due to rising social security costs.

Efforts to boost its birth rates have also met with little success amid the growing cost of living, and notoriously long working hours.

Birth rates are slowing in many countries, including Japan's neighbour, but the problem is particularly acute in Japan.

The country was estimated to have had fewer than 800,000 babies born last year - the lowest number since records began in the 19th century.

In the 1970s, that figure was more than two million.

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