SKorea: Birth Rate Falls to Record New Low

Facts

• Data from Statistics Korea showed on Wednesday that South Korea's fertility rate, the lowest in the world, dropped further last year — from 0.78 to a record low of 0.72 per woman during her reproductive life.¹
• This comes as the quarterly rate consistently declined through 2023, from 0.82 in Q1 to a fresh low of 0.65 in Q4, with less than 230K births registered in the country — down 7.7% from 2022.²
• A fast-aging country whose median age is expected to jump from 44.9 in 2022 to 63.4 in 2072, South Korea has seen its yearly fertility rate falling since 2015 when the figure was 1.24.³
• More than $270B (360T won) has been expensed in government initiatives to try to address this situation since 2006, including childcare subsidies and cash payments upon birth, but to no avail.⁴
• Based on the current low fertility rates, the South Korean population — which has dwindled for the fourth straight year — is projected to nearly halve to 26.8M by 2100.⁵
• A fertility rate of 2.1 children per woman is considered necessary for a country to keep a stable population. This week, Singapore and Japan also reported record lows in their birth rates in 2023.⁶

Sources: ¹Reuters, ²Korea JoongAng Daily, ³Korea Times, ⁴Al Jazeera, ⁵The Guardian and ⁶Nikkei Asia.

Narratives

• Conservative narrative, as provided by The Chosunilbo. Spending hundreds of trillions to try to boost birthrates will remain an ineffective policy as long as the government fails to address the well-known root causes of South Korea's depopulation emergency. Young Koreans have refrained from having kids — and even marrying — due to the lack of quality jobs and affordable homes, as well as education costs. Once these issues have been tackled, births will naturally boom.
• Progressive narrative, as provided by The New York Times. It's certain that high living costs and a tough job market do affect South Korea's fertility rate, but the main driver of the current depopulation trend has been women fed up with suffocating traditional gender norms and sexism in the country. While some argue that feminism is the problem here, actually, gender equality is the key to solving the demographic crisis. The 'birth strike' will end when life is fairer and safer for women.

Predictions