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https://www.reddit.com/r/taiwan/comments/1otsxfv/taiwan_is_pretty_much_cooked_with_deaths_nearly/ Taiwan’s TFR as calculated by BirthGauge on X is 0.75 as of September. A recent post on r/Taiwan shows that October births has fallen 21% again, after two consecutive months of -27% births. This pretty much seals the deal that Korea, with a TFR of 0.81, will escape the dishonor of coming last in births for the past couple of years. With marriages down 15%, it looks like Korea will escape last place for at least the next couple of years (with my prediction that Thailand will follow suit and crash below Korea depending on how our marriages look next year). But I think the monumental crash in Taiwan this year is a harrowing reminder that we must reverse the fundamental trend when there are enough people in the fertile cohort.. If you look at Taiwan’s population pyramid, they are quickly using up their last fertile cohort who were born when Taiwan had a TFR of 1.77 (1997, 29 year olds in 2026). It started crashing to 1.4 in 1996, and it has been crashing since. Meaning, they have no chance reversing the birth rate until people above late 40s retire and leave a huge hole in job vacancies for high-quality jobs. Korea’s TFR fell below 1.7 in 1985, much earlier than Taiwan, but we have a relatively stable number of births reaching into the year 2000. Meaning, it is absolutely a positive sign that we have reversed the birth rates (ongoing for 14 months now), but we don’t have much time left until we could see the absolutely horrific crash Taiwan is seeing now after the 7-8 years of steady decline. I don’t think we will see any meaningful, fundamental rebounds unless we crash Seoul’s housing prices imo. The only way is up for stocks, but the rule of thumb for the real estate market is that it’s impossible to satisfy everyone with any direction. It’ll be a huge blow to Korea’s GDP, but my opinion is that this is the only way we’re reliably going back up to 1.0 regardless of the fertile cohort. Yes, the ideal academic discussion is always going to be about 지방살리기, regional stimulation, and creating southern mega cities to match Seoul. But nevermind whether that’s realistic or not, who’s gonna answer if that’s sustainable when our population is declining anyway? People in their 40s and up will get pensions no problem. How about mid 30s and below? We are delaying answering this question and kicking the can down the road every year because nobody wants to stick out like a sore thumb. Imo if we’re giving pensions to people 40 and up as scheduled, we at least need to give 30s and below a home. What are your thoughts as to how to reverse the trend permanently and sustainably? submitted by /u/snowfordessert |
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