Faced with the danger of elimination, hundreds of rural districts in Japan are plying gifts that include craft beer and balloon rides to entice their mini-diasporas to send tax payments back home.
Offerings of choice cuts of beef and appeals based on emotional attachment also are among the tactics applied by villages, towns and small cities to encourage participation in a program known as "furusato nozei." The initiative allows tax deductions for people who donate money to their hometowns, or any other adoptive location. Among Japan's almost 1,800 local authorities, half are pitching gifts to get donors.
Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's administration is considering an expansion of the program as it seeks to invigorate rural economies before local elections next year. Some 900 population centers will disappear within a generation as the nation ages, according to a report submitted to the government.