Abstract
The decline in Japan’s birth rate, the most rapid in the world, and the aging of its population are not uniform throughout the country. The number of elderly residents of Japan’s regional areas has already begun to decline, while those numbers in Tokyo and other large cities will surge in the future. Because prices are regulated in Japan’s medical and nursing care sectors, we cannot rely on the adjustment of supply and demand based on the price mechanism. The Japanese government should implement measures to correct the uneven regional distribution on the demand side by promoting migration of the nation’s elderly population to regional areas. This chapter proposes reforms to the National Health Insurance and nursing care insurance systems, which currently hinder the movement of Japan’s elderly citizens to regional areas.
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Suzuki, W. (2018). Local Government Financing of Health Insurance and the Revitalization—Facilitating Migration of the Elderly. In: Hatta, T. (eds) Economic Challenges Facing Japan’s Regional Areas. Palgrave Pivot, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-10-7110-2_10
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-10-7110-2_10
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