Birth year 1975

That year, 1,901,440 babies were born in Japan.
Be born again as one of the generation that came of age in the job-market ice age.

Ice-age generationEntered the workforce when only about half of graduates found jobs.

Hover over the chart to browse, click to choose. Any year from 1947 to 2024.
The hundred born this year

A hundred born in 1975

A hundred people lived out their lives at once, on the same statistics. Each band is one life. The left edge is birth, the colour is what they were doing that year, and the length of the band is how long they lived.

Person 1 is being born

Went to university
—Statistics: 29%
Ever married
—Statistics: 78%
No permanent job after school
—67% of graduates hired that year
Average lifespan
—

A hundred lives wobble from run to run. The odds are tuned so that thousands of lives land close to the real statistics.

Where you'd be born

If you were born in 1975. You don't get to choose your prefecture: it is drawn by that year's share of births in each one.

  1. Tokyo8.4%
  2. Osaka7.0%
  3. Aichi5.5%
  4. Kanagawa5.2%
  5. Hyogo4.5%
  6. Hokkaido4.4%
  7. Saitama4.1%
  8. Fukuoka4.0%
  9. Chiba3.5%
  10. 38 other prefectures53.4%

Boys 51.3%, girls 48.7%
Approximated from Vital Statistics and census population

How a life unfolds

 

  1. Year, place and family are drawn

    Your prefecture follows the share of births, your parents' schooling follows their generation's rates, and the family trade follows the era. Your name comes from the names popular that year.

  2. Choose at the crossroads

    Exams, job hunting, marriage, transfers, caring for parents, retirement. Each choice shows the real numbers for that year. Your choices change the road, but not the numbers of your era.

  3. Line up with your classmates

    Four others born the same year in the same prefecture live out their lives too. Put the five bands side by side and you can see how family and era split the paths.

  4. Become a biography

    When the life ends, an AI writes it up as a biography. The cover and band become an image you can share with a link.

Which numbers are real

These are the parts of a life decided by statistics. Figures are rounded from official statistics and interpolated between years.

Births and prefecture
Vital Statistics, census
School enrolment
School Basic Survey
Hiring rates
School Basic Survey, graduate job-openings survey
Earnings
Basic Survey on Wage Structure
Non-regular work
Labour Force Survey
Marriage and children
Vital Statistics, National Fertility Survey
Lifespan and cause of death
Life tables, Vital Statistics
Prices
Retail Price Survey

Read more about the data

Illness, disasters, divorce and suicide happen at their real rates. They are not described in detail. If you are struggling, please reach out to a local helpline.

Go back to that year,and live it again.