Author here. I spent a week in Korea earlier this month and came back with a framework I can't stop turning over. The piece is a first pass, written conversationally after the trip, and I'm aware it has gaps. I'd particularly value pushback from anyone with direct Korea experience or background in urban planning, charter cities, or demographic policy. The strongest critique I've already heard: Korea has tried versions of this idea before (Sejong, Songdo, the satellite cities) and they haven't worked. I think there's a meaningful difference between those incomplete attempts and a more coordinated intervention, but I'd be interested in pushback on whether that distinction actually holds. Also curious whether the underlying framework (call it Bazooka Theory: that stuck self-reinforcing systems require disproportionate coordinated intervention rather than incremental reform) resonates in other domains people work in.

Surely someone must have profiled young Korean women who have had 3 or more children. I wonder what the findings were. (Here, I'm supposing that a 90 year old woman who birthed their youngest child 60 years ago is not as relevant as a 30 year old woman who birthed kid #3 in 2026).