There were 36.17 million people 65 or older in Japan as of Sept. 15, marking a record high, according to an estimate released by the Internal Affairs and Communications Ministry on Sunday.
Japan has the world's highest percentage of people 65 or older, surpassing second-place Italy's 23.3% by about 5 percentage points, according to a United Nations survey.
The elderly people population rose by 300,000 compared to last year, or 28.7% of the total population, up by 0.3 percentage points from last year and also the highest ever.
By gender, there were 15.73 million men 65 or older, or 25.7% of the male population, while there were 20.44 million women 65 or older, or 31.6% of the female population. The ratio of women 70 or older exceeded one-fourth of the female population for the first time at 25.1%.
Those 70 or older, which include the postwar baby-boomer generation born between 1947 and 1949, came to 27.91 million, up 780,000 from last year. There were 18.71 million people 75 or older, up 240,000, while there were 11.6 million people 80 or older, up by 360,000. People 90 or older amounted to 2.44 million, up 130,000.
The ratio of elderly to the total population was 22.2% for people 70 or older; 14.9% for 75 or older; 9.2% for 80 or older; and 1.9% for 90 or older.
There were 8.92 million elderly people who worked at companies and other places in 2019 -- an increase of 300,000 from the previous year, according to the Labor Force Survey. This was a record high, with an increase for the 16th consecutive year, accounting for 13.3% of all employed people, also the highest ever.
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