Below the earlier system, a citizen was deemed to be one 12 months outdated on the day they had been born
Folks in South Korea routinely turned a minimum of a 12 months youthful on Wednesday after Seoul opted to ditch its conventional age-counting strategies to fall consistent with worldwide requirements.
Below the now-obsolete earlier system, a South Korean citizen was thought of to be a 12 months outdated once they had been born, with a 12 months being added each January 1. Nonetheless, this methodology led to confusion for South Koreans visiting abroad, in addition to weird conditions the place a baby born, for instance, on December 31 would turn out to be two years outdated on January 1.
The earlier age-counting system brought on “pointless social and financial prices,” the nation’s President Yoon Suk Yeol mentioned in April. Yoon was a powerful advocate for making the change all through his presidential marketing campaign final 12 months. Polling on the time additionally indicated that greater than 70% of South Koreans favored the transfer.
Seoul’s conventional age-counting methodology had additionally come below scrutiny from different lawmakers, who argued that it undermined South Korea’s repute as a world technological powerhouse on the world stage.
South Korea’s legislature isn’t anticipating too many teething issues amongst its immediately youthful populace. “We count on authorized disputes, complaints and social confusion brought on over easy methods to calculate ages shall be vastly lowered,” Minister Lee Wan-kyu mentioned at a press briefing on Monday, in line with the Korea Instances.
“It feels good,” he added. “For individuals like me, who had been supposed to show 60 subsequent 12 months, it makes you are feeling such as you’re nonetheless younger.”
The newly de-aged South Koreans gained’t see their capability to buy cigarettes or alcohol impacted below the principles, offered that they had been sufficiently old to take action earlier than the change was made. Nor will it influence eligibility for the 21 months of obligatory army service that every one able-bodied males are required to do.
The rationale why the earlier system was adopted generations in the past stays unclear. One principle is that it took into consideration an individual’s time spent within the womb, and rounded 9 months as much as one 12 months. One other is that an archaic Asian numerical system had no numerical idea of zero.
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