40-49 assumes responsibility for taking care of one infirm elderly person at home in 1995, but almost 50 percent of the non-working women of this age group is likely to provide in-home care to elderly patients in 2025. These intertemporal differences in the pattern of increase in the computed ratios among the six age groups are attributable to changes in their labor force participation rates as well as in their cohort size.
The above computational results point to a dramatic rise in the burden placed upon middle-aged Japanese women providing in-home nursing for the frail elderly. These results are likely to change drastically, depending upon the future availability of both (i) public support services through social security programs such as the Golden Plan and its subsequent plans beyond the year 2000, and (ii) long-term care institutions. The degree to which care for elderly patients is internalized through Japan's traditional familial support network is also contingent upon the magnitude of the future demand for female labor force, and upon the commitment of future cohorts of women to care for elderly kin with serious infirmity or illness at home. In view of the financial constraints on the part of the government, the recent trend for female paid employment (Ogawa and Clark, 1995; Ogawa and Ermisch, 1996; Ermisch and Ogawa, 1994), and the rapid filial normative shift (Ogawa and Retherford, 1993b; Retherford, Ogawa, and Sakamoto, 1996), the financial and manpower outlook for providing care to Japanese frail elderly is rather gloomy.
4. Policy Options Facing Japan
The projected results for the macroeconomic and demographic variables suggest that the population of Japan will age at an accelerated speed, which will, in turn, give rise to Japan's slowed economic growth and increased social security costs. These results accord with the government's outlook for 21st-century Japan (Economic Planning Agency, 1983). Although both the abundance of high-quality human resources and the high saving rate have been two principal driving forces of Japan's remarkable postwar growth performance, it is very likely that both of them will drastically change as the aging processes advance over the next few decades. In addition, the borrowing of technologies from the Western developed countries has also played a crucial role in placing the Japanese postwar economy on the high-growth path, but Japan has now entered the stage where
