hankyoreh

In observance of World Population Day on July 11, the National Statistical Office (NSO) released a report on the current status of South Korea’s population that reconfirmed how the speed of our nation’s aging is unparalleled to anywhere else in the world. In this report, the NSO predicted that the percentage of people in South Korea aged 65 and over will reach 11 percent next year, lower than the 15.9 percent average for advanced nations, but will soar to 38.2 percent by 2050, surpassing the 26.2 percent average for advanced nations by a huge margin. This increase is being attributed to an increase in life expectancy and a total fertility rate (TFR) among women that ranks among the lowest in the world.

South Korea’s TRF has been 1.13, less than half the world average of 2.56 for the time period between 2005 and 2010. If this situation continues, our nation’s population will enter a decline after 2019, and while seven people aged 15 to 64 were available to support one elderly person aged 65 or over as of 2007, the situation in 2050 will be each young person will have to support one elderly person. The issue of low birth rate and an aging society poses a severe problem for South Korea’s future.

The government has recognized this as an urgent issue and responded by enacting the “basic law in the age of low fertility rate and aging” and formulated an initial five-year plan in 2006. At the center of this policy are measures to encourage fertility, for example through incentive payments, and to promote welfare for the elderly. However, after briefly shooting up in the Year of the Golden Pig, the birth rate has once again entered a downward trend. This demonstrates that the hoped-for results cannot be obtained simply through policies that encourage fertility.

Some analysts are suggesting the reason South Korea has such an extraordinarily low birth rate among the countries of the world is due to a social structure that makes it difficult to give birth to and raise children. Young people shun marriage because of the instability of the employment structure, and even those who marry are reluctant to have children because of the burden of child-care and education expenses. The system of child-care support is also terribly inadequate. Indeed, various studies have shown more than half of respondents declaring that they are declining to have children because of child-care expenses and unstable employment. This means that without resolving this fundamental problem, it will be impossible to solve the low birth rate issue merely through policies that provide fertility encouragement funds.

The government’s policies are heading in the wrong direction. There has been an explosive growth in private education costs and the employment situation is highly uncertain. Because the administration is placing emphasis employment flexibility and increasing competitiveness, companies are hiring irregular workers for an estimated 50 percent of available positions instead of offering regular contracts. This must not continue. The government needs to actively prepare for a society with a low birth rate and an aging population, and enact a major shift in its concept of social policies pertaining to education and employment.

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