A survey of people in their late teens across Japan has found that slightly less than half of the respondents think they will have children. It also indicates that many of them are concerned about money and work when it comes to starting a family.

The Nippon Foundation held the online survey in December, covering 1,000 individuals aged between 17 and 19.

Asked whether they want to have children, 59 percent of the respondents said yes.

But asked whether they think they will have children, 46 percent said yes while 23 percent answered no. Thirty-one percent said they have no idea or have never thought about the question.

The respondents who said they think they will have children were also asked to choose what they think may become obstacles to their starting a family.

Allowed to pick multiple answers, 69 percent, or the most, of them chose financial burden, followed by difficulty balancing work and child-rearing at 54 percent.

On the same question, 37 percent of the female respondents chose psychological burden and 36 percent picked physical burden. Both figures are more than 10 percentage points higher than those of their male counterparts.

Forty-four percent of the male respondents chose time constraints. That is over five points higher than that of their female counterparts.

The survey asked all respondents to choose three measures they want the government to implement to help reverse the low birthrate.

Thirty-nine percent, or the most, of them picked making school tuition free, followed by expanding benefits and subsidies for child-raising households.

More than 20 percent chose encouraging the use of child-care leave as well as improving and increasing the number of day-care centers.

The Nippon Foundation says the survey outcome should be taken seriously as it suggests that many young people have concerns about money and work when having children.

It adds that there is a need to provide various types of support to address young people's wide-ranging concerns.