World Facts: Ph vs. Kr

Last weekend has been a holiday for the country in remembrance of those who already passed away. Even if the family doesn't really believe on the Catholic teachings, in a predominantly Catholic country, it is hard to ignore occasions like this. Spending time at the cemetery, watching living people and tombs and tombstones of the dead gives one plenty of time to wonder on life, death rate, birth rate, population, cremation etc.

Seeing the cemetery crowded at this time of the year makes me wish that I'll be cremated when my own time comes around, provided of course that it will not be an environment hazard of course. I don't want to be in a coffin and seal in concrete blocks, for whatever it will look like later on. I prefer to go back to the soil, decompose naturally. And so does my Aunt -- I am not alone.

As I have often wondered, there are more births than deaths in the Philippines. I am not wishing for the opposite but at least, there should be an even number somewhere. The country's population growth rate is really a big issue and it affects a number of things in the country. I will not go to specifics on this but it's staring right at our faces.

On the other hand, Kr (I am only particular to this country coz of personal reasons) has only a mere 0.266% (ranks at #178 in the world) comparing to Ph of 1.957 % (ranks at #61 in the world). Meaning that population increase in the Philippines is way too healthy for our own sake. UAE has 3.69 as the highest rate of population increase and Cook Islands with -3.3 % as the lowest. Here are some more numbers to crunch taken from CIA World Factbook as of July 2009.

Ph page Kr page Philippines VS South Korea
Population: 97,976,603 (July 2009 est.) vs. 48,508,972 (July 2009 est.)country comparison to the world: 12th vs. 25th

(Ph population is almost twice of that of Kr.)

Age breakdown: 0-14 years: 35.2% (male 17,606,352/female 16,911,376) vs. 16.8% (male 4,278,581/female 3,887,516)
15-64 years: 60.6% (male 29,679,327/female 29,737,919) vs. 72.3% (male 17,897,053/female 17,196,840) 65 years and over: 4.1% (male 1,744,248/female 2,297,381) (2009 est.) vs. 10.8% (male 2,104,589/female 3,144,393) (2009 est.) (Again, the children's population is twice more than in the Ph. While the opposite is true with the 65 year old and above. There are more old people in RoK and more children in Ph. )

Life Expectancy:
total population: 71.09 years vs. 78.72 years
country comparison to the world: 133 vs. 40 male: 68.17 years vs. 75.45 years
female: 74.15 years (2009 est.) vs. 82.22 years
(South Koreans generally live longer than their Filipino counterparts.)

Net Migration
-1.34 migrant(s)/1,000 population (2009 est.) vs. -0.33 migrant(s)/1,000 population (2009 est.)
country comparison to the world: 132 vs. 102

(Although both countries indicates negative signs, meaning the number of people who moves out of their country, there are still more Filipinos who leaves Philippines.)

Education Expenditures:

2.5% of GDP (2005) vs. 4.6% of GDP (2004)
country comparison to the world: 158 vs. 85

(Again, South Koreans spends twice more in educating their nation than that of Filipinos.)