South Korea reports record-low weddings as birth rate plunges
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Seoul, South Korea: Creating a trouble for South Korea, the number of weddings that had taken place in the nation last year hit a record low, a report says.
Falling number of weddings will further compound the looming demographic crisis the nation is currently facing alongside having the worlds’ lowest birth rate, according to a report by AFP.
A data released by Statistics Korea said 192,000 couples got married last year, which was down by more than 40 percent from a decade earlier.
Last year Korea saw its lowest number of marriages since records began in 1970, while some 327,000 couples had married in 2012.
The average age for men to get married last year showed a record high of 33.7 years old and women also hit a record high of 31.3 years old, showing reluctance to find partners at early age, the report said. Nearly 80 percent of couples married last year were doing so for the first time.
Breaking a previous record of lowest birth rate in 2021, South Korea reported the lowest ever number of babies born last year reporting 249,000 births.
Despite the government spent 280 trillion won ($213 billion) since 2006 to boost birth rates, South Korea’s population is estimated to fall from 52 million to 39 million by 2067.
Experts link low marriage and birth rates to high child-rearing costs and property prices alongside difficulties in getting well-paid jobs in a highly competitive society.