Society Lower house passes child care aid bill to tackle low birth rate

[thomas]

On Friday, the Lower House approved a bill to expand monthly child allowances and parental leave. This move is part of an effort to address the country's persistently declining birthrate. Here are the key points from the bill:

The bill is expected to be enacted during the current Diet session through June following deliberations at the upper house. A new funding scheme will be set up with higher monthly health insurance premiums from fiscal 2026. The legislation aims to expand child allowances to those aged between 16 and 18 and remove the income limit. The current monthly allowance for a third or subsequent child will be doubled to 30,000 JPY (USD 190).

Other features of the bill include providing parents taking child care leave with more benefits and expanding day care services to make children eligible regardless of their parents' employment status. To implement the measures, the government plans to cut social security spending and create the fund to secure up to 3.6 trillion yen annually in the next three years. The launch of the new "child support fund" is based on the view that the costs should be shared more broadly and fairly to address the common challenge of boosting the number of children. The government aims to collect 600 billion yen at first and increase it to 1 trillion yen under the new funding scheme in fiscal 2028. The amount to be shouldered by individuals will vary depending on their income and public medical insurance.

Japan lower house passes child care aid bill to tackle falling births - The Mainichi

TOKYO (Kyodo) -- Japan's lower house passed a bill Friday to expand monthly child allowances and parental leave in an effort to tackle the country's p

mainichi.jp