Noah Smith, Columnist

South Korea Foreshadows a Gray, Slow-Growth Future

Birth rates have collapsed, pointing to rapid population aging and slowing productivity.

July 16, 2019 at 6:30 AM UTC

Noah Smith is a former Bloomberg Opinion columnist. He was an assistant professor of finance at Stony Brook University, and he blogs at Noahpinion.

Still not enough.
Photographer: Kim Jae-Hwan/AFP/Getty Images

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In 1960, South Korea had a total fertility rate of more than six children per woman, high enough to cause a population explosion. But as the country developed, this number dropped decade by decade:

A country needs a fertility rate of about 2.1 -- a little more than one child per parent -- to maintain long-term population stability. South Korea’s fertility is now about half that number. And it’s still falling. The country’s statistics office reported that in 2018, the fertility rate fell to a record low of 0.98 -- much lower even than in countries such as Japan, whose rate is above 1.4.