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Korean Job Discussion Forums
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RJjr
Joined: 17 Aug 2006
Location: Turning on a Lamp
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 Posted: Thu Jan 29, 2009 5:05 pm Post subject: |
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| agentX wrote: |
Well, guess it's time I did my duty for Uncle Sam- er, Uncle Lee  and solve this problem. Stand aside, boys/netizens. Let a man's man take care of this problem. 
President Lee, I'm going to need the following:
1 hotel. The whole hotel. Preferably a nice one.
The phone numbers of every woman of breeding age in Korea. Married ones included. Ugly ones too. Yes, desperate times call for desperate measures. You can be Churchill or Chamberlain, Hoover or FDR, Mario or Luigi.
Each room will be stocked with silk sheets, MP3 players loaded with Barry White or Boyz 2 men, scented candles, and a DVD player with some chick flicks. The rooms in this country already come stocked with towels and body lotion. 5 different types of alcohol should be in the fridge as well as 5 different types of chocolate candy.
Outside staff will be vital to this operation, so don't be squeamish about recruiting from abroad. Don't worry- this can be accomplished with as little as 14 North American males. Why so few? They don't like to share.
In 9 months time, with as little as 10 billion won, you won't have a birthrate problem to be worried about. You'll have other things to worry about President Lee, but that's not why you hired me. |
Awesome!  |
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Big_Bird
Joined: 31 Jan 2003
Location: Sometimes here sometimes there...
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| Posted: Thu Jan 29, 2009 10:38 pm Post subject: |
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| Kuros wrote: |
| ontheway wrote: |
Korea is overpopulated, as is much of the world. Korea needs to have a low birthrate for quite a while until the country can level off at a sustainable population level.
It is not true that the low birthrate is a problem for the country economically. It's just that very few people understand economics. Falling birthrates deplete the massive pools of uneducated workers and human cannon fodder that socialist governments depend on. The socialistic ponzi schemes cannot continue. But, Korea will be much better off if the population falls to a much lower level. |
Town A ,Town B, Town C each have 1,000 citizens. All these citizens are married and 25-35 years of age. They each have another 500 existing elderly citizens who will die in 30 years. . Town A has a 1.5 birthrate, and Town B has a 2.5 birthrate, and Town C has a 4.0 birthrate.
In 30 years, Town A will have just under 1,000 soon-to-be-elderly but only 750 25-35 year olds to support them. Town B will have just under 1,000 soon-to-be-elderly but as many as 1,250 25-35 year olds to support them. Town C will have just under 1,000 soon-to-be-elderly but 2,000 25-35 year olds to support them.
Town C may have growth problems, but it has a free workforce to develop and implement the technology needed to transition (lets give them 30 years of progress, and recall that 30 years ago there were no such things as personal computers).
Town A's population did increase: but only from 1,500 to 1,750. However, its worker-to-elderly ratio is a lot worse than it was. Town B is going to be okay, although they will need productivity gains (much from technological advances) for their standard of living to keep up with the dwindling worker-to-elderly ratio.
Right now Korea's birthrate is 1.2, as is Japan's. This is not a stable decline: its a precipitous drop. If Korea's birthrate were 1.8, I wouldn't bother worrying. 1.8 is less than optimal, but it would be okay. But its 1.2. You cannot halve your population like this without making it old and infirm. |
Good post. I think people who don't care much for maths fail to understand the logarithmic nature of the problem, and don't understad that a birthrate of 1.2 will result in an enormous decline.
More elderly people living longer is going to be an enormous problem for a society like this, and could have devastating consequences, perhaps requiring some very unpalatable solutions. |
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Juregen
Joined: 30 May 2006
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| Posted: Fri Jan 30, 2009 12:19 am Post subject: |
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| Ya-ta Boy wrote: |
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And if you are talking about hakwons...no one held a gun to their heads and forced them to sign up.
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I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that almost certainly you never had a kid of your own. Most parents want the best for their kid/s and in Korea that means education, education and then more education.
I'd bet anything that if the public schools improved to the best in the world, the parents here would still send their kids to multiple hakwons after hours. It's just the mindset.
Didn't I read somewhere that parents spend about 1/3 of their monthly income on education for the kids? |
And so it is.
It's like celebrating Christmas back home, if you don't do it something is wrong with you.
What would be better though is not that they stop spending that money, but that they actually get what they pay for. 200$-500$ per month on education should really make a difference.
But in Korea it doesn't, it simply doesn't. |
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Juregen
Joined: 30 May 2006
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| Posted: Fri Jan 30, 2009 12:23 am Post subject: |
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| Big_Bird wrote: |
| Kuros wrote: |
| ontheway wrote: |
Korea is overpopulated, as is much of the world. Korea needs to have a low birthrate for quite a while until the country can level off at a sustainable population level.
It is not true that the low birthrate is a problem for the country economically. It's just that very few people understand economics. Falling birthrates deplete the massive pools of uneducated workers and human cannon fodder that socialist governments depend on. The socialistic ponzi schemes cannot continue. But, Korea will be much better off if the population falls to a much lower level. |
Town A ,Town B, Town C each have 1,000 citizens. All these citizens are married and 25-35 years of age. They each have another 500 existing elderly citizens who will die in 30 years. . Town A has a 1.5 birthrate, and Town B has a 2.5 birthrate, and Town C has a 4.0 birthrate.
In 30 years, Town A will have just under 1,000 soon-to-be-elderly but only 750 25-35 year olds to support them. Town B will have just under 1,000 soon-to-be-elderly but as many as 1,250 25-35 year olds to support them. Town C will have just under 1,000 soon-to-be-elderly but 2,000 25-35 year olds to support them.
Town C may have growth problems, but it has a free workforce to develop and implement the technology needed to transition (lets give them 30 years of progress, and recall that 30 years ago there were no such things as personal computers).
Town A's population did increase: but only from 1,500 to 1,750. However, its worker-to-elderly ratio is a lot worse than it was. Town B is going to be okay, although they will need productivity gains (much from technological advances) for their standard of living to keep up with the dwindling worker-to-elderly ratio.
Right now Korea's birthrate is 1.2, as is Japan's. This is not a stable decline: its a precipitous drop. If Korea's birthrate were 1.8, I wouldn't bother worrying. 1.8 is less than optimal, but it would be okay. But its 1.2. You cannot halve your population like this without making it old and infirm. |
Good post. I think people who don't care much for maths fail to understand the logarithmic nature of the problem, and don't understad that a birthrate of 1.2 will result in an enormous decline.
More elderly people living longer is going to be an enormous problem for a society like this, and could have devastating consequences, perhaps requiring some very unpalatable solutions. |
Another mathematics is, if there is fewer economic resources to maintain an elderly population, they will die sooner too .....
I am all for quality of life, but prolonging life just for the sake of it ....
Young people now should see what is happening and start building their nest, cause when we are old, I doubt the government will do anything about it.
Age is not a disease, and dying isn't one either. |
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mises
Joined: 05 Nov 2007
Location: retired
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| Posted: Fri Jan 30, 2009 10:41 am Post subject: |
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Korea isn't alone..
http://www.reuters.com/article/worldNews/idUSN1621412920070516
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Cuban population, birth rate falling: official
Wed May 16, 2007 3:12pm EDT
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HAVANA (Reuters) - Cuba's population declined in 2006 for the first time in 25 years due to fewer births, the Communist Party newspaper Granma said on Wednesday.
The Cuban population dropped last year by about 4,300 to 11,239,536 inhabitants, according to official statistics.
The number of births dropped to 111,084 in 2006 from 120,716 a year earlier, an 8 percent decline, the country's top demographic expert, Juan Carlos Alfonso, told Granma.
Cuba's populace is aging fast and there is a marked rise in the number of people aged 60 and over compared to other age groups, Alfonso said.
Women are deciding to have fewer children, said Alfonso, director of population studies at the National Statistics Office.
On average, Cuban families tend to have only one child. The country has faced economic hardships and overcrowded housing since it lost the support of the Soviet Union 15 years ago.
The government traces the falling birth rate to its policy of providing free contraceptives, mainly condoms, which are used by 70 percent of Cubans aged 15 to 44.
Rising life expectancy -- now at 77 years -- has given Cuba the demographics of the industrialized First World even though it is a Third World nation, officials say.
Today, 16.2 percent of the Cuban population is 60 or over, according to the National Statistics Office. The agency estimated that about one-quarter of the Cuban populace will fall into that category by 2025.
That is a worrying statistic for any society because it means a smaller working population and escalating costs for the state in health care and social security.
Wealthier countries solve the problem with immigration. In Cuba's case, emigration has been a constant since Fidel Castro's revolution in 1959 steered the country to Communism. |
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nateium
Joined: 21 Aug 2006
Location: Seoul
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| Posted: Sun Feb 01, 2009 8:17 am Post subject: |
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| Big_Bird wrote: |
Good post. I think people who don't care much for maths fail to understand the logarithmic nature of the problem, and don't understad that a birthrate of 1.2 will result in an enormous decline.
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What's wrong with immigrants taking care of the old people? It seems to be working in other developed countries.... |
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RJjr
Joined: 17 Aug 2006
Location: Turning on a Lamp
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| Posted: Sun Feb 01, 2009 8:07 pm Post subject: |
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| nateium wrote: |
| Big_Bird wrote: |
Good post. I think people who don't care much for maths fail to understand the logarithmic nature of the problem, and don't understad that a birthrate of 1.2 will result in an enormous decline.
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What's wrong with immigrants taking care of the old people? It seems to be working in other developed countries.... |
Cool avatar.  |
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