For South Korea, this is a national crisis!
At the beginning of 2024, South Korea** released the latest statistics:In 2023, only 23 percent of the total number of births in South Korea will be born50,000 people, down 11% from the previous year, the number of births not only hit a record low in the country's history, but also ranked first in the world in terms of birth rate.
As of December 2023, the total population of South Korea is about 5,13250,000 people, a decrease of about 11370,000 people.
In a country of 50 million people, the average number of births in a month does not exceed 20,000, which is indeed a bit unbelievable.
Due to the continuous decline of the country's population, Seoul, as the capital of South Korea, fell below the 10 million population mark for the first time since 2016, and now there are only 9.41 million people, and there is no city with a population of 10 million in South Korea.
Internationally, cities with a population of more than 10 million are called "megacities", which not only represent the size of the population, but also are a symbol of commercial prosperity, economic development and social civilization. Even if you look at the world, there are only about 30 megacities with more than 10 million megacities. Whether it's South Korea as a whole, or core cities, the trend behind the demographic data is getting scary:South Korea's population continues to decline, and the demographic crisis is intensifying. First of all, it is reflected in the declining birth rate, which in the annual statistics of the United Nations Population **, the total fertility rate of South Korea in 2022 is 087, has been the first to last for three consecutive years. For a country to maintain population stability, it needs to have a total fertility rate of at least 21, and South Korea's total fertility rate is not just a star and a half, but a 4% discount. Except in times of war and disaster, South Korea's birth rate is a grim situation that no other country has ever encountered. Secondly, it is reflected in the natural population growth rate, which in 2021 was -272, or 2 per 1,000 people7 people. According to this law, the total population of South Korea will fall to about 36.2 million in 50 years. The whole of South Korea is also wailing about this, and they all feel that the country is about to end. Even a professor of demography at the University of Oxford in the United Kingdom even warned of South Korea's population problems, saying that South Korea may become "the first country in the world to disappear". Moreover, it is a country that destroys the country without natural disasters and wars. 2
The decline in the number of births leads to negative population growth, which is most directly manifested in the aging of a country and society. In 2020, the proportion of the elderly population over 65 years old in South Korea was 157%, if the current trend of the birth rate is extrapolated, the total population of South Korea will fall to about 36.2 million in 50 years, nearly half of which are aged 65 and above, and South Korea will enter a super-aging society. This means that 1 in 2 Koreans is elderly. The aging population is intensifying and the labor force population is decreasing, resulting in a gradual decrease in the number of people who are economically activeA large number of schools are closed. According to the Ministry of Education, as of March 2022, a total of 3,896 schools in South Korea, including elementary, middle, and high schools, were closed. In the past five years, more than 20 majors in Korean regional universities have disappeared, and in 2023, 26 majors from 14 universities in South Korea have not been applied. The economy is no longer growing. Bank of Korea, the first bank of Korea, issued a report in December last year warning that South Korea's economy will fall into negative growth by 2050 if it does not take effective measures to boost the sluggish fertility rate. Pensions are depleted across the board. The number of workers who pay pension insurance has shrunk, but the number of pensioners has risen sharply, and the situation of "more monks and less porridge" is inevitable, and South Korea's social security system will be unable to make ends meet. **South Korea's pension insurance is expected to turn into a deficit in 2041 and be exhausted in 2056. In other words, after more than 30 years, the pension insurance system will be unsustainable, and if it is not reformed, South Korea's "post-95" generation will no longer have a pension to receive when they retire. Although South Korea** stipulates the statutory retirement age, in the face of the increasingly serious problem of aging, this regulation seems to be a fictitious one. There are no more young people to take care of the whole society, and many elderly people in South Korea have to work until they are 70 years old to stop, otherwise they will starve to death. Currently, more than 4 million elderly people in South Korea continue to earn a living after retirement, and most of these jobs are cleaners that others are unwilling to doSome old people who really can't find a job have no choice but to go to the streets**, more than half a hundred years old, still picking up customers on the streets, physically and mentally exhausted, and endure ridicule. Births are declining, aging is accelerating, and in 30 years, South Korea will be "old and poor". 3
Of course, we don't have to laugh at South Korea, and no one in the three East Asian countries needs to laugh at anyone, and the population problem is a common problem facing the whole of East Asia.
South Korea has a population of 51.63 million and 23 newborns50,000 people;
Japan, 12.5 billion people, 770,000 new births;
Taiwan, China, with a population of 23.3 million and 130,000 newborns;
Hong Kong, China, population of 7.5 million, 3260,000 people;
The three northeastern provinces at the same latitude as South Korea will have 37 new births in 2022740,000, you must know that the total population of the three eastern provinces is close to 100 million. In such a comparison, it is not as good as South Korea.
If we convert the number of births in South Korea according to the proportion of the total population, it is equivalent to 6.46 million births a year. In fact, some institutions have speculated that the number of newborns this year is about 7.88 million based on the data of domestic pregnant women this year.
Overall, we are a little better off than South Korea on the issue of population decline.
In fact, in the face of the population problem, the route we have taken or the problems that have arisen have been walked through or encountered by Koreans a long time ago.
In other words, if nothing really changes, South Korea's today will be our tomorrow when it comes to depopulation.
After the war, South Korea experienced a decade-long increase in human growth, and in order to control the size of the population, the Korean version of the "family planning policy" began to be implemented in the 70s, which they called the "family planning" policy.
After 10 years of policy regulation, South Korea's fertility rate has risen from the highest to 60 down to 28. This is a very desirable fertility rate for population growth. Since the 90s, South Korea's fertility rate has continued to fall below 2, and it has begun to encourage childbirth through a series of new policies, and three policies have been introduced in 15 years.
In the first round of policies, we will expand support for infant and child care and education expenses, increase the number of institutions that take care of children in place of parents after school, strengthen childcare-related mechanisms, and promote childcare leave within companies.
In the second round of policies, the burden on working parents was reduced, a paid parental leave system was introduced, loan conditions for newlyweds to purchase a house were relaxed, and support for infertile couples was increased.
The third round of the policy, the support policy for newlyweds to buy or rent housing, expanded support for pregnancy, childbirth expenses, infertility, and high-risk mothers. In addition, by strengthening the public education function, we will reduce the burden on parents of education expenses.
At present, the fourth round of policies has been implemented, providing 300,000 won (about 1,800 yuan) of childcare subsidies to families with babies aged 0-1 years old every month, and gradually increasing to 500,000 won in 2025In addition, South Korea** will also provide a one-time maternity subsidy of 2 million won. The new policy also introduced the "3+3 parental leave" system, which means that both parents can apply for three months of childcare leave for their children under the age of 12 months, and each parent can receive a childcare allowance of up to 3 million won per month, so as to encourage "husband and wife to raise children together".
In the past 16 years, South Korea has spent a total of nearly 280 trillion won (about 1 yuan) in encouraging fertility5 trillion yuan), all of which have not received obvious results, but continue to deteriorate, knowing that now there are concerns about "destroying the country".
South Korea, the world's 10th largest economy, has a GDP of 17 trillion US dollars, GDP per capita is 330,000 US dollars (Chinese per capita GDP 1.)270,000 US dollars), which has long entered the ranks of developed countries. According to our understanding, developed countries have more sound social security systems, it will be much easier to raise children than developing countries and poor countries, and the fertility rate will not be too low.
But the fact is that the fertility rate continues to decline, ranking first in the world, and more and more young people are reluctant to have children.
The reasons why young people don't have children can be summed up: employment, housing and education, these three mountains keep them away from love, marriage and childbearing.
Doesn't that sound particularly familiar!
Therefore, in the matter of not having children, the "common problem" faced by all developed countries and countries that are about to enter the industry of developed countries is not unique to China, nor can it be solved by one or two subsidy policies.
Having said that, it is certainly better to have policies to encourage young people to have children than no policies at all, but we must not hope for that little subsidy, but need to be drastic and comprehensive.