Future Timeline

Japan is the Future of the Rich First World
While oversimplified, here’s my best stab at what’s likely to happen to other first world nations over the decade or two ahead:

-A country works hard and gets wealthy, swelling with momentum and direction
-People find careers and education as good reasons to put off having a family – or as more fulfilling than family life (which was once a tradition, and is now a choice)
-A portion of the population loses their relevance in the job market (due to an economic downturn, or simply a change in marketable skills)
-Men without healthy incomes are unable to marry or start families even if they want to
-Men and women with healthy incomes are often intimidated by childcare costs, and their higher education and modern culture prevent them from preferring large families by default
-Population ages, economy stagnates
-Many shamed and “left behind” men either commit suicide (quickly, as in with a gun – or slowly, through abuse of drugs or alcohol) or escape into a world of simple gratification (drugs, pornography, video games)

This same trend is easy to see in countries. Video games in the relatively rich Nordic countries are one example. Opioid crisis in the United States is another example. Plummeting birth rates and reduced frequency of sex among Western youth are probably also symptoms – as well as increasing teen suicide and addiction to social media.

Japan simply has a sped-up experience of the above phases.