No, it's not a good thing. No amount of spin can make it a good thing.
You get less pressure on the environment incl. less resource consumption and traffic congestion with a smaller population. Economically they actually get a higher per capita income and the workforce to dependent citizen ratio is the same, just olds and not children. Health care costs are low by world standard due to a healthy lifestyle.
What is this? "Higher per capita income"? Who do you think produces GDP? If there are no children to become workers then how does the ratio stay the same? Why hasn't that ever been observed? Why would this precipitate a healthy lifestyle?
There being no people at all would be great for the environment and for traffic congestion. Do you think there should be no people? What you are saying is absurd.
It seems that you didn't read the article before you commented. It is the authors argument based on interviews with researchers, not mine. Some of the claims are counterintuitive, but that doesn't necessarily mean they are wrong.
1) Income is of course produced by the workforce, but the point the article makes is that the ratio of productive citizens to dependents in Japan stays constant, just with fewer children and more olds in that group. In this context it is quite plausible that productivity (due to tech improvement etc.) increases more than the loss due to a shrinking workforce.
2) The article deals with the current situation in which the worker/dependent ratio is stable. You are right that this seems unlikely long term with a (too) fast shrinking workforce (you would need a more gradual reduction for that). Even if we assume they will still get a worse dependent/workforce ratio long term, the point is that this effect will be smaller than often assumed (given that people have a tendency to forget that olds are not the only dependent group in society). Given the excellent health of Japanese seniors they are also in a better position to postpone retirement age than most Western countries.
2) Japan
has a healthy lifestyle (incl. diet) which is why they are better equipped to handle depopulation than most. Health costs don't go through the roof in the same way they would in the US with a similar population distribution.
3) Of course there should be people in the world, but world population was 2 billion in 1927 and is fast approaching four times that number. Imagine how much more space and natural resources we would have if we were still at that level. Most of our current problems in the world are due to being too many to share limited resources.
4) As said before: In the long run depopulation will come to us all due to individualisation, higher education level and rising living standards (well educated affluent career women don't want lots of kids). It is a scenario we better learn to figure out how to use in a constructive way and it is basically also a necessity in order to achieve a sustainable world.
