South Korea is aging – and its care facilities are changing to keep up.
The number of childcare centers in the country has shrunk by nearly a quarter in just a few years, reflecting the authorities’ unsuccessful campaign to encourage couples to have more babies.
In 2017, there were more than 40,000 day care centers, according to new government figures released last Friday – by the end of last year, that number had fallen to around 30,900.
Meanwhile, as the population ages rapidly, the number of institutions for the elderly has increased from 76,000 in 2017 to 89,643 in 2022, according to the country’s ministry of health and welfare.
Facilities for seniors include nursing homes, specialist hospitals and welfare agencies that help seniors navigate social services. Meanwhile, the day care centers listed include public, private and corporate services.
The move illustrates a years-old problem that South Korea has failed to reverse. It has one of the world’s fastest-aging populations and lowest birth rate, which has been falling steadily since 2015, despite authorities offering financial incentives and housing subsidies to couples with more babies.
Experts attribute this low birth rate to a number of factors, including demanding work cultures, stagnant wages, rising costs of living, the financial burden of raising children, changing attitudes towards marriage and gender equality, and growing disillusionment between generations. younger.
In the late 2000s, the government began to warn that policy measures were needed to encourage families to grow. Last September, South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol admitted that more than $200 billion has been spent trying to increase the population over the past 16 years.
But so far nothing has worked – and the effects have been increasingly visible in the social fabric and in everyday life.
Many elementary and middle schools are closing across the country due to a lack of school-aged children, according to Korean news agency Yonhap, citing the education ministry.
Figures from the country’s official statistics body show that the overall number of primary and secondary schools has remained stagnant for years, increasing by just a few dozen since 2015.
In Daejeon, south of Seoul, one of these abandoned schools has become a popular spot for photographers and urban explorers; the images show eerily empty hallways and a schoolyard overgrown with wild grass.
Similar crises have been seen in other East Asian countries with falling birth rates. A village in Japan has gone 25 years without registering a single birth. The arrival of a baby in 2016 was heralded as a miracle, with elderly people marching to the baby’s house to hold him.
Meanwhile, South Korea’s expanding elderly population has meant an explosion in demand for services for the elderly, putting pressure on a system that is struggling to keep up.
South Korea has the highest elderly poverty rate among Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) countries, with more than 40% of people over 65 experiencing “relative poverty”, defined by the OECD as having income less than 50% of the household’s average disposable income.
“In Korea, the pension system is still maturing and current generations still have very low pensions,” the OECD wrote in a 2021 report.
Experts point to other factors such as global economic trends, the breakdown of old social structures that forced children to care for their parents, and insufficient government support for those who struggle financially.
That means many homeless seniors – part of a generation that helped rebuild the country after the Korean War – must seek help from shelters and soup kitchens.
The rapid increase in senior facilities in recent years may help to alleviate some of these problems. But long-term concerns remain about the future of Korea’s economy, as the number of young workers – who are crucial to sustaining health care and pension systems – slowly declines.
Source: CNN Brasil
Bruce Belcher is a seasoned author with over 5 years of experience in world news. He writes for online news websites and provides in-depth analysis on the world stock market. Bruce is known for his insightful perspectives and commitment to keeping the public informed.
