From 2023, South Koreans will become younger as govt scraps traditional way of counting age

The South Korean government on Thursday passed laws that scrap the Korean-age system and aligns it with the international standard.

From next year, the Koreans would have to include their birth date to calculate their age, which will make them at least one or two years younger. The international method of calculating age will be implemented from June 2023.

Currently, South Koreans use the Korean age system in which 1 year is added to the baby once it is born. Under this, Koreans are deemed to be a year old when born and a year is added every January1. They tend to include the 9 months of the baby being in the mother’s womb.

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The dual age system is followed to calculate the legal age for drinking alcohol and smoking.

However, since the early 1960s, South Korea has for medical and legal documents also used the international norm of calculating from zero at birth and adding a year on every birthday.

“The revision is aimed at reducing unnecessary socio-economic costs because legal and social disputes, as well as confusion, persist due to the different ways of calculating age," Yoo Sang-bum of the ruling People Power Party told parliament, according to Reuters news agency.

On Thursday, the National Assembly passed a partial amendment bill to the Civil Act and a partial amendment bill to the Basic Administrative Act.

The decision to move the amendments follows a survey conducted by the Ministry of Government Legislation on unifying the age-counting system. In that opinion poll, and 8 out of 10 citizens (81.6 per cent) agreed that the system should be unified.

Moreover, 86.2 per cent of the citizens said they would use the birth date age in their daily lives after the law is enacted.

(With inputs from agencies)

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