When it comes to economic growth, age is not just a number, as Korea’s working age population shrank for the first time, officially making the country an “aged society.”

When it comes to economic growth, age is not just a number, as Korea’s working age population shrank for the first time, officially making the country an “aged society.”

According to Statistics Korea, the number of working age people between the ages of 15 and 64 fell by roughly 0.3 percent from 36.31 million in 2016 to 36.2 million last year. It is the first time that this number declined year-on-year since the statistics agency started collecting population data. As such, there is little hope that the working population can rebound as the number of people under the age of 15 keeps dwindling.