Low birth rate in South Korea

The low birth rate in South Korea demonstrates the intersection of the low fertility rate in South Korea and government policies. South Korea's birth rate has declined since 1960.[1] Until the 1980s, it was widely believed that this demographic trend would end and that the population would eventually stabilize.[1] However, Korean society faces a decline in its future population because of the continuously decreasing birth rate.[1] After the baby boom in the 1950s, the population increased drastically, and the Korean government implemented an anti-natalistic policy in the 1960s. This government program mandated that Korean healthcare centers provide a family planning consultation by introducing traditional contraception methods, including intrauterine devices (IUDs), vasectomies, and condoms to the public.[1] Along with this policy and economic growth, the fertility rate declined because more married women pursued a higher standard of living rather than raising children. After the economic crisis in 1997, the fertility rate declined rapidly.[1]

Demographics of South Korea
Total population in South Korea from 1960 to 2015
Population	51,014,947 (2015)
Growth rate	0.53% (2015)
Death rate	541.5 people
Life expectancy	82.1 years (2015)
• male	79 years (2015)
• female	85.2 years (2015)
Fertility rate	0.84 births per women (2020)
Infant mortality rate	2.7 deaths per 1,000 live births
Age structure
0–14 years	13.8% (2015)
15–64 years	73.4% (2015)
65 and over	12.8% (2015)
Sex ratio
Total	100.6 (per 100 female)

Before the economic crisis, Korea used foreign capital for economic development but didn't implement foreign exchange management policies, resulting in a significant decrease in the county's credit rate.[2] As a result, businesses shut down and unemployment increased, leading to an increasingly unstable society. After the economic crisis, young people had less economic and professional security, leading many young men and women to delay marriage.[1] The marriage rate also declined after the mid-1990s.[1] In 2021, South Korea experienced a natural population decline, for the first time in history.[3]

Birth rate statistics

Fertility rates in Korea and OECD average from 1980 to 2010

According to the Organisation for Economic Cooperation Development (OECD), the fertility rate in Korea declined steeply from 1970 to 2015.[4]

The South Korean fertility rate of 1.8 children per woman was below the OECD average fertility rate of 2 children per woman in 1984 and has remained below average since then.[4] Korea's fertility rate decreased drastically by 1.7 children per woman from 1979 to 2015.[4] In 2018, the total fertility rate in South Korea declined to 0.98, which indicates the number of children that a woman gives birth to during her lifetime.[5] In order to maintain a population of 50 million, the 2018 fertility rate (0.98) needed to match the replacement level (2.1).[5] In 2018, the crude birth rate reached a low of 6.4 (live births per 1,000 people that year).[5] Among OECD, Korea was the only country whose fertility rate declined below 1.[5] The number of newborn babies declined 8.6% from 2017 to 2018, becoming the lowest birth rate for South Korea.[5]

Total Fertility Rate[6]

Date	Fertility Rate
2009	1.15
2010	1.23
2012	1.24
2012	1.3
2013	1.19
2014	1.21
2015	1.24
2016	1.17
2017	1.05
2018	0.98
2019	0.92
2020 Q3	0.84

Total Fertility Rate by Metropolitan Area

Metropolitan Area	Total Fertility Rate as of 2019[7]	Population as of 2019[8]
Seoul	0.72	10,010,983
Busan	0.83	3,459,840
Daejeon	0.88	1,493,979
Gwangju	0.91	1,480,293
Daegu	0.93	2,468,222
Incheon	0.93	3,029,285
Gyeonggi	0.94	13,653,984
Jeonbuk	0.97	1,851,991
Gyeongam	1.05	3,438,676
Chungbuk	1.05	1,640,721
Gangwon	1.08	1,560,571
Ulsan	1.08	1,168,469
Gyeongbuk	1.09	3,438,676
Chungnam	1.11	2,194,384
Jeju	1.15	696,657
Jeonnam	1.23	1,903,383
Sejong	1.47	346,275

Causes

Sex preference

In the twentieth century, selective abortion of female fetuses had an important impact on the low birth rate.[9] In Korea, there is a strong sex preference for a son because of the belief that a daughter cannot carry the family name, thus preventing the preservation and continuation of a family line. [10] Moreover, because South Koreans have a preference to have a son as a first child rather than as a second or third child, the abortion rate for female fetuses was high. These preferences caused a high sex ratio, an imbalance of more men than women, which may possibly lead to another episode of low birth rate in the future.

From 1981 to 1988, the sex ratio at birth continued to increase to about 116.55 males to 100 females in the early 1990s.[10] The natural sex ratio at birth is around 105 males to 100 females, so anything higher indicates sex-selective abortion. Despite sex-selective abortion being illegal, the number of prospective parents aborting female fetuses after checking the sex increased. As a result, in 1988, the government banned doctors from revealing the sex of a fetus to expecting parents.[10]

Education cost

Koreans prioritize their children's education, which is in alignment with their Confucian values, which emphasizes the relationship between higher education and socioeconomic status.[11] Some Korean citizens send their children to expensive hagwon, for-profit after-school educational institutes, in the hope that their children achieve the high results required to enter a prestigious university. In 2009, more than 75% of South Korean children attended private academies.[11]

The hagwon curriculum emphasizes English, math, and writing because of the competitiveness of entering the nation's top three universities: Seoul National University, Korea University, and Yonsei University (collectively known as SKY).[11] In Korean society, sending children to hagwon became a social norm to the point that those who cannot afford to send their children to hagwon are regarded by others as irresponsible and ignorant parents.[12][11]

In 2005, a national survey revealed that 18.2% of women aged 20 to 29 years chose not to have a second child because of the cost of extra education.[12] Parents prefer no more than one or two children to focus on each child's success with the less financial burden.[12] According to a survey by the Health Ministry in 2012, 90% of people who participated in the survey stated that they are reluctant to have children because of high education cost, including private education fees.[13]

Female labor force

As the economy has developed, more South Korean women entered university, resulting in a growth in the female workforce.[12] More women have postponed marriage and pursued improvement of their standard of living rather than having children.[12] From 1985 to 2007, the average age at which a South Korean woman first married increased from 24.1 years to 28.1 years.[12] Moreover, the female college enrollment rate also increased from 31.3% in 1990 to 83.8% in 2008. As the percent of women working outside the home increased from 42.8% in 1980 to 50.2% in 2005, the birth rate also decreased from 6.0 children per woman in 1960 to 1.13 per woman in 2006.

Increased divorce rate

The divorce rate increased by 0.7 from 1970 to 2000 in South Korea. Divorce is the most significant event that affects family dissolution, which results in a low fertility rate.[14] Even though divorce affected birth rate slightly overall from 1970 to 2000, after the economic crisis in 1997, the rapid increase in the divorce rate affected the decrease in the birth rate.[14]

In the economic crisis, many families were dissolved as they could not afford to support their family members. The crude divorce rate increased to 2 (divorces per 1,000 population) in 1997 and increased rapidly to 2.5 in the following year. In 2003, the crude divorce rate jumped again to 3.5.[1]

Effects

Future population

The Ministry of Gender Equality and Family showed that the Korean youth population was 14 million in 1980. However, the youth population decreased significantly to 10.2 million in 2012, constituting 20.4% of the country's total population.[15] This decline of the youth population is caused by the low birth rate and will affect the future population count. In 2013, the Korean government revealed that if the fertility rate continues to decrease, the number of people ages 9 to 24 years old will decline by 50% from 2013 in 2060.[15] Under the low growth scenario, the working age population is projected to drop from 33.48 million people in 2017 to 14.84 million people (44.1% of the total population) in 2067.[16]

This trend will affect South Korea socially and economically in the long term.[17] Because the number of children continues to decrease, school closures continue to increase.[17] If this trend continues, schools will need to be consolidated and rural city administrations will need to be merged to reduce unnecessary personnel and expenditures.[17]

South Korea also has an aging society, which means that there are a greater number of senior citizens with a smaller number of young people to support them.[17] A survey from the Health Ministry in 2012 reported that more than 83% of respondents believe that this aging society will lead to more taxes and a labor shortage.[13]

The population decline resulting from a low fertility rate could diminish South Korea's potential economic growth to less than 2% as the labor force declines.[17] This lack of economic growth could affect South Korea's sovereign credit and fiscal strength after 2030.[17] Furthermore, the declining number of children could also affect the Korean Army's military budgets.[17] As the number of eligible young men is decreasing, the government could pressure the armed forced to maintain the current military structure while their budget decreases, as national funds are redirected to the problems of aging and low fertility.[17]

Government policy

The Korean government implemented a new policy in 2006 that aims to improve reproductive healthcare services to resolve the low fertility rate.[12] However, this policy had no effect to increase the fertility rate. Therefore, the Committee on Ageing and Future Society (CAFS) was founded in 2003 to increase the fertility rate and to prepare for the problem of an upcoming aging society.[12] The Presidential Committee on Aging Society and Population Policy, which is reinforced by CAFS, announced the First Basic Planning for Low Fertility and Aged Society in 2006.[12] This planning includes support for daycare and preschool education and economic benefits for multi-child families, such as social insurance.[12]

The Korean government announced the pro-natal policies to increase the fertility rate in South Korea on December 2, 2018.[18] The purpose of this policy is to create a positive environment for parents to have more than 2 children by decreasing medical and child-rearing expenses and providing a better support system for working mothers.[18]

Moon Jae-in, the president in South Korea who was elected in 2017, announced that the government will expand a subsidy for parents of young children to triple the proportion of infants and toddlers looked after by publicly run centers.[18] The government expects that before 2022, the number of newborn babies could decrease to less than 300,000 per year, so their goal is to maintain a rate of more than 300,000 newborn babies every year because of the continuous decrease in fertility rate.[18]

The Ministry of Health and Welfare stated that this government's improved plan would increase the standard of living for an entire generation and resolve the problem of low fertility rate in the long term.[18] Starting in 2019, the government promised to provide financial support of medical expenses for infants younger than 1 year.[18] Additionally, the government plans to offer financial support for preschool children by 2025.[18]

The government also increased financial support for married couples who have difficulty conceiving a child. That married couple could be subsidized more than 70% of the medical cost for artificial insemination for a maximum of four sessions.[18] Starting in the second half of 2019, according to the Ministry of Health and Welfare, parents who have children younger than 8 years old can leave work an hour earlier, and paid paternity leave is increased to 10 days.[18]

References

1. Kim, Doo-Sub (June 2005). "Theoretical Explanations of Rapid Fertility Decline in Korea" (PDF). The Japanese Journal of Population. 3.
2. "Korea's Economic Adjustments Under the IMF-supported Program--Presentation by Kunio Saito". IMF. Retrieved 2019-05-26.
3. "South Korea's population falls for first time in its history". the Guardian. 2021-01-04. Retrieved 2021-01-30.
4. "Demography - Fertility rates - OECD Data". theOECD. Retrieved 2019-05-17.
5. "Korea fertility rate hits record 0.98 low". ProQuest 2185962407.
6. "Statistics Korea". kostat.go.kr. Retrieved 2020-11-29.
7. "Statistics Korea". kostat.go.kr. Retrieved 2020-11-29.
8. "South Korea: Cities - Population Statistics, Maps, Charts, Weather and Web Information". www.citypopulation.de. Retrieved 2020-11-29.
9. Donaldson, P. J.; Nichols, D. J.; Choe, Ehn Hyun (1982). "Abortion and Contraception in the Korean Fertility Transition". Population Studies. 36 (2): 227–235. doi:10.1080/00324728.1982.10409029. JSTOR 2174198. PMID 22077273.
10. "How to stop parents aborting girls". 2017-01-13. Retrieved 2019-05-11.
11. Anderson, Thomas; Kohler, Hans-Peter (2013). "Education Fever and the East Asian Fertility Puzzle". Asian Population Studies. 9 (2): 196–215. doi:10.1080/17441730.2013.797293. PMC 4038909. PMID 24883076.
12. Lee, Sam-sik (March 2009). "Low Fertility and Policy Responses in Korea" (PDF). The Japanese Journal of Population. 7.
13. "Low birthrate serious, education costs to blame". The Korea Herald. 2012-01-17. Retrieved 2019-05-27.
14. Eun, Ki-Soo (March 2003). "Understanding Recent Fertility Decline in Korea" (PDF). Journal of Population and Social Security. 1.
15. "South Korea: Low birth rate to cut youth population by half in 2060". Asia News Monitor; Bangkok. ProQuest 1267137242.
16. "Statistics Korea". kostat.go.kr. Retrieved 2020-11-29.
17. Stangarone, Troy. "North Korea Can't Solve South Korea's Demographic Crisis". The Diplomat. Retrieved 2019-05-27.
18. "Govt. to lower child-rearing expenses to tackle low birthrate". The Korea Herald. 2018-12-07. Retrieved 2019-05-26.