Japan's government is considering a new way to get people to consider life outside Tokyo: Pay them to leave.

 

日本政府正考虑用一种新方法让民众离开东京去其他地方生活——那就是，花钱请他们走。

 

According to a report by national broadcaster NHK on Nov. 22, the government is mulling giving as much as 3 million yen¹ to people who decide to relocate from the 23 wards² of Tokyo and find jobs elsewhere, starting in the next fiscal³ year.

 

Tokyo and the greater metropolitan⁴ area surrounding the capital, with a total population of some 38 million, have long bucked⁵ the trend in Japan when it comes to demographics, even as Japan's overall population shrinks. That's often been at the cost of other cities.

 

Tokyo and the prefectures of Chiba, Kanagawa, and Saitama posted significant population growth in 2017. According to NHK, the number of people moving to Tokyo has exceeded the number moving out for 22 years and counting. Nearly one out of every three people in Japan lives in the Tokyo area.

 

The government added that as more people leave other major cities such as Sendai and Sapporo in the north of Japan for Tokyo, it will encourage people to relocate to those places, for example through tax benefits.

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