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On Wednesday June 28, South Korea officially put an end to its traditional age calculation system, in favor of the international system. A change that has allowed South Koreans to gain a year, or even two for some.
Until last Wednesday, the age of South Koreans was calculated according to an ancestral principle: the day of their birth, they were already one year old. On January 1 of each year, they took one more year.
Children aged two when he was only one
Which means that their actual birthday had no influence on their age. Thus, babies born on January 1 and December 31 of the same year celebrated their 2nd birthday on January 1 of the following year. But in reality, those born on January 1 were only one year old and those born on December 31 were only one day old!
This system, based on taking into account the months spent in utero to determine a person’s age, is an ancestral method from East Asia. South Korea was the last country to still apply it while the majority of the inhabitants pleaded for its abandonment, according to a poll published in January 2022. China, Japan and North Korea had abandoned it there are decades.
The old calculation system maintained in certain situations
For the past week, the law (passed last December) has therefore imposed the use of the international system (our own) for official documents. But in practice, this reform will have a limited impact because the actual date of birth was already used for the passport, for justice, health services or even retirement benefits. On the other hand, despite this change, the old age calculation system will continue to be applied in certain situations. For example, South Koreans will be able to buy cigarettes and alcohol the year they turn 19 and not from their birthday. This means that a young person who will turn 19 on October 16, 2023, can already buy alcohol and cigarettes since January 1, 2023.