South Korea Will Standardize Their Age System To Be On Par With Everyone Else
In South Korea, you could be 2 years old within the first six months of life.
The Korean age system currently states that a person is one year old at birth and then gains a year on the first day of each new year.
In a separate method – the “counting age” – a person’s age is calculated from zero at birth and a year is added on 1 January. This method exists primarily to calculate the legal age to drink alcohol and smoke.
But South Korea also uses the globally recognized system in which age is calculated by an individual’s birthday and the first birthday is celebrated 365 days after birth.
This means that, for example, as of 8 December 2022, a person born on December 31 2002 is 19 under the international system, 20 under the counting system and 21 under the Korean system.
Now, this is super confusing, so the government says it will adopt the same system used by the rest of the world.
