South Korea Has Spent $200 Billion Trying to Raise Its Birth Rate. It Is Now the Lowest Ever Recorded.

A government audit has confirmed that South Korea's total fertility rate fell to 0.68 in 2024 — the lowest figure ever recorded by any country in peacetime — despite twenty years of pro-natalist policy spending that has totalled an estimated $200 billion in cash transfers, childcare subsidies, and parental leave incentives. The audit asks, with unusual candour, whether the money was wasted.