(Commentary) Over the past two decades, successive Japanese governments have improved the terms of parental leave, invested in a day-care system with expanded hours, and directed employers to offer flexible and reduced hours to parents of young children. But Japan’s birth rate hasn’t changed much. Japan’s “programs do reduce the costs of raising children,” writes Leonard Schoppa, a politics professor at the University of Virginia, but “most career jobs in Japan ask employees to work until 08:00 or 09:00 pm every night and accept transfers at the risk of their continued employment.” Generous pa...