Copyright cnbc
Despite the bleak outlook for Asia's fourth-largest economy, some analysts caution against despair. Lee, who was also the former director general of the national statistics agency, said economies can find ways to adapt. "When an economy faces recession, it typically responds with various efforts to enhance productivity through technological innovation, immigration policies, and other measures to prevent further decline," she said. AEI's Eberstadt also noted that South Korea can maintain and even increase its prosperity despite aging and shrinking. He pointed to the 1970s, when fears of resource scarcity grew as the world's population surged and doubts arose about how to feed it. In 1968, the book The Population Bomb, co-authored by former Stanford University professor Paul Ehrlich and researcher Anne Ehrlich, predicted global famine and a rising death rate as the population grew. However, 50 years later, the world is "richer, better educated, better fed, better housed, more prosperous, much less absolute poverty, than when the world was smaller," Eberstadt said. KPPIF's Lee said that, considering the Korean government's rapid policy changes and evolving public awareness in recent years, she is confident that breakthrough solutions will emerge. Very few people would have bet that South Korea could accomplish what it has today when the Korean War halted in 1953, Eberstadt said. "Human beings are a uniquely adaptable," he added. "This is a very different sort of challenge, but I don't think that the record of the immediate past suggests that it's smart money to bet against South Korean population."
