South Korea's Birth Rate Drops to 0.68, Lowest Globally

Statistics Korea Confirms Record-Low Fertility for Fourth Straight Year

South Korea's total fertility rate fell to 0.68 children per woman in 2025, Statistics Korea reported on March 23, 2026, extending the country's position as the nation with the lowest birth rate on Earth. The figure represents a decline from 0.72 in 2024 and marks the fourth consecutive year of record lows. Only 216,000 babies were born in 2025, compared to 249,000 in 2023 and 436,000 a decade ago.

Seoul recorded the lowest regional rate at 0.55, while only Sejong City, a planned administrative capital with younger residents, exceeded 1.0 at 1.12. The national death count of 372,000 exceeded births by 156,000, accelerating the population decline that began in 2020.

Government Response

President Yoon Suk-yeol convened an emergency population policy meeting and announced an expanded "Demographic Emergency Declaration" with 46 new measures valued at 112 trillion won ($81 billion) over five years. Key measures include a monthly birth incentive of 3 million won ($2,170) for the first year of each child's life, 100% tuition subsidies through university, and priority access to public housing for families with two or more children.

Deputy Prime Minister Choo Kyung-ho acknowledged that "previous measures totaling 380 trillion won over the past 18 years have failed to reverse the trend" and said the new package focused on housing affordability and workplace culture — the two factors most cited by young Koreans as barriers to family formation.

Structural Drivers

A survey by the Korea Institute for Health and Social Affairs found that 65% of unmarried adults aged 25-39 cited housing costs as the primary reason for delaying marriage, followed by job insecurity (58%), education expenses (52%), and gender inequality in domestic labor (47%). The average age of first marriage rose to 33.7 for men and 31.5 for women.

South Korea's hyper-competitive education system, where families spend an average of $800 per month on private tutoring per child, creates a powerful economic disincentive for larger families. The country's notoriously long working hours — an average of 1,872 per year, 17% above the OECD average — leave little time for family life.

Long-Term Projections

The National Assembly Budget Office projected that South Korea's population would halve from 51.7 million to 25.5 million by 2100 if the current fertility rate persists. The working-age population is expected to decline from 36.6 million to 14.8 million over the same period, raising fundamental questions about the viability of the pension system, military conscription, and the tax base.

Demographer Cho Young-tai of Seoul National University said the 0.68 rate "has no historical precedent in any society. We are in genuinely uncharted demographic territory, and the policy tools available to governments are modest compared to the cultural forces driving the decline."