"The Middle Class Must Be Able to Maintain Their Current Standard of Living in the Future"
NH Investment & Securities 100-Year Life Research Institute Proposes New Standards for the Middle Class
The Ability to Actually Enjoy the Current Standard of Living
and Sustain It in the Future Becomes the New Benchmark
On September 16, the 100-Year Life Research Institute at NH Investment & Securities' Retirement Asset Management Division announced that it had published the 133rd edition of the 'THE100 Report,' which analyzes the current economic conditions of middle-class households in Korea and proposes a new definition of the 'true middle class.'
'THE100 Report' is a flagship research publication by the 100-Year Life Research Institute at NH Investment & Securities, providing in-depth studies on a wide range of topics, including lifetime asset management and aging trends, to help people live a stable life in an era where living to 100 is increasingly common.
This edition introduces a new standard that moves away from the conventional income- and asset-based perspective of defining the middle class, instead asking, "Are households actually enjoying an adequate standard of living at present, and are they able to maintain that standard in the future?"
In line with this, the report classifies income, spending, and savings as 'current living conditions,' while categorizing assets, liabilities, and retirement preparedness as 'future sustainability conditions,' thereby presenting new criteria for identifying the 'true middle-class' households in Korea.
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Kim Dongik, Head of the 100-Year Life Research Institute at NH Investment & Securities, commented, "It is not easy for many people to readily answer whether they belong to the middle class. However, when applying the new standards outlined in this report, it turns out that only one in four households truly qualifies as middle-class." He added, "Given that vulnerability in retirement preparedness greatly affects perceptions of the middle class, preparing for retirement is emerging as an even more vital task in lifetime asset management."
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