Educational Pressure May Have Cut South Korea’s Birth Rate by 28%, Study Finds

South Korea’s intense competition over educational status may have reduced the country’s birth rate by 28%, according to research presented at a joint conference involving the Bank of Korea, the Centre for Economic Policy Research and the OECD.

The paper, titled “Status Concerns, Intensive Parenting, and Low Fertility in Korea,” was presented by Yum Minchul, an economics professor at Virginia Commonwealth University. Yum co-authored the study with Kim Seong-eun of Sejong University and other researchers. Their model examined how social comparison affects education spending and decisions about having children.

The analysis found that stronger status competition pushes private education costs higher while lowering fertility. The researchers tested the findings through cross-national comparisons using education-related concerns from the World Values Survey. They also examined regional and temporal changes in regulations governing late-night tutoring at private academies. Korea, Singapore and Chile were cited as examples of the pattern.

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Status Concerns, Intensive Parenting, and Low Fertility in Korea

For South Korean women born between 1970 and 1975, the average number of children was estimated at 1.92. Without the effects of status competition, the figure could have reached 2.45, a 28% increase. The researchers said the problem was not simply that parents rationally invest more in an only child. They argued that parents’ fixation on how their children compare with others creates socially excessive education spending.

When parents believe a child will be unhappy after falling behind peers, they may choose to have one child and invest heavily in that child instead of having more children while spending less on each. The researchers said Korea’s emphasis on academic credentials and achievement amplifies this anxiety. They also found that low-income households in Korea devote a larger share of their income to private education, although the provided account ends before detailing the full finding.

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choose to have only one child and devote their efforts to them, rather than having more children while investing less intensively in each child.