They already can't give away housing in areas of rural Japan that are emptying out.
The value of land is socially created. When there's no one around, no economy, etc, it's basically worthless. Japan is rapidly approaching this point. You'll be able to get cheap land if you want to be a weird hermit, but everyone else is going to continue to flood to the cities, the only places where there will remain any sort of economy.
Not really sure how or why food would get cheaper with less people. If anything the opposite as it's more expensive to make it locally with less workers available.
As remote work oppurtunities increase and the younger generation begins to settle down, there will be a natural return to small towns on the outskirts where they can offer their families more for less. Japan does a good job of making their cities liveable for anyone, and commuting in/out is unparalleled.
>Not really sure how or why food would get cheaper with less people. If anything the opposite as it's more expensive to make it locally with less workers available.
Automation in agriculture continues to expand. And in my experience most Japanese tend to prefer locally made products despite the higher prices. This was most obvious when I saw the pile of australian steaks sitting next to a much smaller cut of domestic steak that were nearly sold out at the supermarket. Or consider that Seiko make identical watches domestically, and in SEA, but the "Made in Japan" models are only sold in Japan.
There are still ~1MM babies born in Japan every year. They will be fine with a reduction in population. They don't seem keen on expanding immigration anyway, or a demographic shift, so I don't understand the desire to push mass immigration on every nation with a declining birth rate. They're not bothering anyone by wanting to keep Japan, Japanese.
