South Korea entered the ‘super-aged society’ in 2025 with over 20 percent of elderly people out of total population. In this time of multiple troubles such as end of population bonus, working-age population reduction and population aging, it is expected that high-level population policies utilizing immigrants will be needed, rather than the current short-term circulation-based overseas workforce utilization policy. As a way to maintain an appropriate population size, the immigrant inflow and utilization policy will need to be closely linked to the changes in the size and structure of Korea's population and set a mid- to long-term vision and goals.
Prof. Changik Jo is an economics professor and chair of School of Global Studies at Hallym University. He had taught at the Baruch College, CUNY and Anderson University in U.S. and was an affiliated research associate at the CDC. His teaching and research focuses on applied microeconomics and policy modeling. His research outcomes are found in Value in Health, European Journal of Epidemiology, Hepatology International, Asian Review of Insurance, Hitotsubashi Journal of Economics, etc. He received his bachelor and master degree in Economics from Seoul National University, and Ph.D. in Economics from the City University of New York in 2004.
