Credit: Public domain.
The upturn in South Korea’s birth rate continued through July, as the number of children born increased by 5.9% year-over-year. The number of births has been steadily increasing since July 2024, an unbroken 13-month streak. Marriages, too, saw an increase of 8.4% year-over-year in July, building on July 2024’s already strong numbers following the end of COVID-19 social distancing measures.
In addition to the end of the pandemic, the increase is also due in part to“echo boomers” - members of the microgeneration born in the early 1990s - reaching their 30s, the peak years for marriage. As of July, there were approximately 1.66m women between the ages of 30 and 34, an increase of 9.2% since July 2020.
