Truth Behind Lowest Birth Rate in the World: South Korea
# Are South Koreans Truly Selfish for Abstaining from Parenthood
Despite the fact that Korea is leading culturally with K-Pop idols like “BTS” and series like “Squid Game” and everything looks bright when you look at it from the screen, “Hell-Chosun” (Chosun means “Korea”), “Fire-Peninsula” these are the terms the South Korean MZ generation uses to describe our country. Why would we call our country hell?
Let’s first touch on the facts, only facts first.
- South Korea has the lowest birth rate in the world of 0.6769%. This means that there will be less than 1 baby per every couple¹.
- South Korea’s suicide rate reached 25.2 deaths per 100 thousand population. It is 12th in ranking in the world in terms of suicide rate in the world².
- 40% of South Koreans 66 years old and above are living in poverty, the highest rate in OECD³.
I used to play Blizzard’s game “Diablo II”. This game has a difficulty level of “Normal”, “Nightmare”, and “Hell”. The difficulty increases as you progress from “Normal” to “Hell”. Of course, when you try to compare to North Koreans, life in South Korea is very blissful but our MZ generations choose to call “Hell” regardless as a word to describe life in Korea. What would be the cause of all these social problems? Let’s start looking at it one by one in detail.
1. Very “A”sian Mindset with Highly Competitive Culture
Asian parents are famous for being competitive. Even before a baby is born, some of the Korean mothers choose to listen to prenatal music. As the baby is born and grows, they will go through countless enrichment classes and tuition apart from school. From the age of 3, kids will attend many classes like English, math, science, piano, swimming, Taekwondo (Korean traditional martial arts), and many other enrichment classes. When they reach high school, their enrichment and tuition are at the peak as Korean parents believe in the brand value of university names and their children’s fate is defined by those names of universities; It’s quite true for some reason in Korea because this is a corporate culture in Korea to support people from same university for promotions.
Competition is very fierce for top universities and both parents and children must put in an extreme amount of effort to get into those top universities. In normal Korean high school, they normally start their class at 9 am (must reach by 8:30) with every 50-minute hour interval with a 10-minute break until 1 pm. Then, they will have a 1-hour lunch break, followed by another 50-minute hour class/10-minute break interval class till 6 pm. 6 pm to 7 pm they will have dinner, followed by a 7 pm to 10 pm self-study session monitored by teachers.
Don’t forget that meeting those schedules will make you study better as everyone is doing the same. You will need to go for the enrichment class from 10 pm to 12 pm or 1 am to make the difference and excel. Then you wake up at 6 am, have your breakfast and the same loop repeats for 3 years in high school until you get into university. Crazy right?
You won’t believe this, but they even have enrichment for Jump rope class for extra marks at school. My nephew lives in Daechi-dong (highly renowned for its educational environment in Seoul). He is 12 years old and 5th year of primary school, but he is already learning calculus which is taught at the high school year 2 level. Imagine the stress he would have day to day…
Earlier I mentioned that Korean University provides brand value to yourself when you get the job or start your own business in Korea. Statistically, 73.8% of Koreans are enrolled in university. That’s a crazy high percentage and yet many of the graduates are having a hard time finding jobs after their studies.
Graduating from a top university doesn’t guarantee a great job but it is becoming like the bare minimum for the chance for an interview. So, again another competition starts, unlike what parents will motivate their children “Once you go to university, you will be able to do whatever you want”, they will be once again stuck in the study loop for extra certificates which help them to stand out amongst candidate for the limited position in high paying corporates.
Parents spend crazy lots of money on children’s education and enrichment, believing and hoping that they won’t suffer from lack of education in this competitive world. Eventually, many elderly don’t have enough money to retire as they would have spent all their savings to children’s education. What’s even worse, children are not able to support their parents due to high competition in the job markets and high living costs.
2. High cost of living and housing prices in Korea
In average, South Koreans earn USD 48,922 amount per annum⁴ whereas housing price in Seoul is 703,020 USD amount⁵. This means that the average person has to work 14.37 years without spending a penny to afford a house in Seoul. Without parental support, it becomes very hard to buy a house independently.
Ever seen birds lay eggs without a nest? I believe it’s the same logic for them to choose not to get married and have children.
3. Lack of Social Support for Giving Birth
Dual Income and No Kid (DINK) is a new popular trend and lifestyle of many married couples in Korea. The high cost of living and crazy high price, pushed both husband and wife to work together and yet there is no proper daycare system for babies and socially it’s not supporting culture to have maternity and paternity leave.
Many people lose their jobs after maternity/paternity leave and are forced to leave by colleagues and the company. Believe it or not, nurses must take turns and get permission before they can give birth in order due to their hectic nature of work.
There were many social news about not giving them work after they came back from baby care leave. So, either you choose work or the baby but if you choose the baby, you won’t have a job to raise them, leaving them no choice but to work without thinking about the plan for the baby.
4. Korean’s Comparative Mindset
Due to Facebook, Instagram, and many social media, Koreans' concept of being average is too high. People tend to see highlights of other people’s lives and think that that’s the standard or average; to have overseas travel, live in fancy houses, drive a great car, etc.
For marriage, the minimum expectation is to have a hotel wedding, a proper proposal, and a bridal shower to show off on social media which again light fire to Korea’s comparative consciousness.
On average, you will require 8,000 USD to have an average standard wedding highlighted above and not many people are willing to go below that, as they are concerned about how other people would see them.
5. Korean People are being too Considerate
I believe South Koreans are smart and aware that we are social/corporate slaves. Knowing this, they don’t want to pass down the stress/pain to their offspring. Thus, they defy the very basic instinct of giving birth.
Can we call South Koreans selfish for not taking responsibility? They choose to defy their instinct, as they know that they can’t provide good conditions and environment for their children. The only option left for them is to live a happy life at least for themselves.
Wrapping it up
The Korean government is aware of these challenges and has implemented numerous policies to address them. However, despite their efforts, the birthrate continues to decline annually. If this trend continues, the younger generation will have to bear the heavy burden of supporting old age and taxation will skyrocket. In such circumstances, who would willingly choose to have children?
We hope that South Korea can overcome these social problems and transform into a place where not only does it look good in dramas and movies, but also offers a genuinely favorable living environment for its citizens.
References
[1]: Macrotrends (2023)| South Korea Birth Rate 1950–2023 | MacroTrends
[2]: Sam Kim (2022)| Korea’s Suicide Rate Rises, Remains Highest Among OECD Nations — Bloomberg
[3]: Cheon Ho-sung (2023)| 40% of Koreans 66 and up are living in poverty, the highest rate in OECD : National : News : The Hankyoreh (hani.co.kr)
[4]: L. Yoon (2023)| Average salary in South Korea annually 2022 | Statista
[5]: Statista Research Department (2023)| South Korea: price of houses in Seoul by type 2023 | Statista
[6]: L. Yoon (2023) | University enrollment rate in South Korea 2022 | Statista
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