In South Korea, age is not necessarily counted from when one is born. The new President Yoon Suk-yeol who will take office on May 10 could fix the paradox by "rejuvenating" everyone by a year
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It seems obvious to count the age starting from when one is born, but it is not so in South Korea where the counting is done differently, leading to different ages. But newly elected President Yoon Suk-yeol who takes office on May 10 could end this chaos by taking a year away from everyone.
In South Korea, a newborn is already one year old (we do not know if they are counted in months of gestation but in any case our accounts would not add up the same): it is the traditional method widely used in the Asian country. But there is more, because on New Year's Eve children earn another year. A little one born in December will therefore already have two years in a few weeks.
But this paradox may soon change as newly elected president Yoon Suk-yeol is pushing for the abolition of this age-old counting method. As the BBC reports, Lee Yong-ho, head of the president-elect's transition committee, the incoming administration will seek to standardize how age is counted to bring South Korea into line with the rest of the world.
Indeed, he admitted that different age calculations led to "persistent confusion" and "unnecessary social and economic costs". In fact, there is also another calculation method that attributes an extra year to newborns on January 1st following their date of birth.
With this method, a child born in December 2020 is two years old by January 2022, even if he has not officially turned two until December of that year (and is also used in military service and for crimes of sexual violence).
The third, in force only since 1992, calculates the age as in the rest of the world, i.e. from actual birth and is used in many administrative practices. But, being recent, it is not very popular in the country with long traditions.
Conclusion? Kim Tae-hyung aka V of the K-pop band BTS, born on December 30, 1995, is 28 years old (Korean age), 26 years old (international age) or 27 years old (other Korean official age). And for some he might just be a number, but age is taken very seriously in South Korea.
For South Koreans, understanding whether someone is older than them or not is more important than finding someone's name in a social context - Shin Ji -young, professor of Korean Language and Literature at the University of Korea explains to the BBC - is essential. to choose how to address that person and the honor or title that is required
The new proposal appears to have been widely accepted by some, but experts say they have doubts that it will actually be implemented. The Korean tradition of age measurement has very ancient roots, tracing its origins in China and in different parts of Asia. But South Korea is believed to be the only country that still commonly counts age in this way.
La globalization made Koreans more aware of the international era - says Kim Eun-ju, professor of law and politics at Hansung University - This has an impact on young people who feel Koreans are being ridiculed for [these counting systems]
But this would also be the least impactful consequence.
Some parents, for example, have tried to cheat the birth registration system, fearing that their children born in December would be disadvantaged in school and, consequently, later in life.
During the pandemic, there were also requests for age standardization, after health authorities used the international age and the Korean age interchangeably to set the age range for thesuitability for vaccine, creating a lot of confusion.
Lee had previously highlighted "unnecessary social and economic costs" caused by Korean age, referring to a lawsuit that went all the way to the Supreme Court due to the confusion over the age for extra wages and retirement.
Yet the system could resist: in 2019 and 2021, in fact, two legislators proposed similar bills that were subsequently not turned into law at the Korean Assembly.
In any case, even if the government succeeds this time, Koreans are unlikely to stop using their "Korean age" very soon. But perhaps a standard would put an end to at least some legal disputes if not the "everyday" confusion.
Curiosity: if we want to calculate our "Korean age" we can use the Korean Age Calculator, available for this link.
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Source: BBC
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