Yoo Young Yi’s grandmother gave birth to six children. Her mother gave birth to two. Yu does not want anything, writes the daily newspaper Asahi Shimbun, analyzing the demographic situation in South Korea. “My husband and I love children very much… but there are things we would have to sacrifice if we were to raise children,” said Yu, a 30-year-old worker at a financial company in Seoul. “So it was a question of choosing between the two things, and we agreed to focus more on ourselves.”

There are many people like Yoo in South Korea who have chosen either not to have children or not to marry at all. Other advanced countries are also experiencing similar trends, but the demographic crisis in South Korea is much more serious.

In September, South Korea’s statistics agency announced that the birth rate last year was 0.81. This is the lowest level in the world for the third consecutive year.

The population shrank for the first time in 2021, raising concerns that the shrinking population could hit the economy – the world’s 10th largest – hard due to labor shortages and higher welfare costs as the aging population grows and the number of taxpayers is decreasing.

President Yoon Suk-yeol ordered the authorities to find more effective ways to solve the problem. The birth rate, he said, is falling even though South Korea has spent 280 trillion won ($210 billion) over the past 16 years to try to increase the birth rate.

Many young South Koreans say that, unlike their parents and grandparents, they do not feel obligated to have a family

They cite the uncertainty of the labor market, expensive housing, gender and social inequality, low levels of social mobility and the huge cost of raising children in a highly competitive society. Women also complain about a persistent patriarchal culture that forces them to take care of children while enduring discrimination in the workplace.

“In short, people think that our country is not easy to live in,” said Lee So Young, an expert on population policy at the Korea Institute of Health and Social Affairs. “They think their children can’t have a better life than they have, and so they wonder why they should worry about children.”

Many people who fail to get into good schools and get decent jobs feel that they have become “abandoned” and that they “cannot be happy” even if they marry and have children because South Korea does not have a developed social security system , Choi Eun-gyun said. , an expert at the Korean Institute of Child Care and Education.

Yu also revealed that until she entered college, she really wanted a child. But she changed her mind when she saw how her colleagues in the office struggle with raising children, sometimes taking time off to go home to a sick child. She added that male colleagues do not do this.

“After seeing this, I realized that my concentration at work would be greatly reduced if I had children,” Yu said.

Her 34-year-old husband, Jo Jung Hwi, believes that having children is not necessary. A translator at an IT&C company, he says he prefers to enjoy life.

There is no official data on how many South Koreans choose not to marry or have children. But figures from the national statistics agency show that there were about 193,000 marriages in South Korea last year, down from a peak of 430,000 in 1996. The agency’s data also showed that about 260,600 babies were born in South Korea last year, up from 691,200 the year before. 1996 year.

Kang Han-byul, a 33-year-old graphic designer who chose to remain single, believes that South Korea is not a healthy place to raise children. She mentioned frustration over gender inequality, widespread digital sexual harassment against women, such as spy cameras hidden in public toilets, and a culture that ignores those who stand up for social justice.

“I will only be able to consider marriage when our society becomes healthier and gives equal status to women and men,” Kahn said.

Ha Hyun-ji, 26, Kang’s roommate, also decided to stay single after her married friends advised her not to get married because most of the housework and childcare falls on them. Ha worries about the huge amount of money he will spend on a private school for the kids so they can keep up in an education-obsessed country.

“I can live happily without marriage and enjoy life with my friends,” said Ha, who runs a bar in Seoul.

Until the mid-1990s, South Korea maintained birth control programs that were originally launched to slow the country’s postwar population explosion. The nation distributed free birth control pills and condoms at community health centers and offered exemptions from military training for men if they had vasectomy.

In 2021, when Yoo and Joe went public on their You Young You Young YouTube channel about their decision to live without children, some posted abusive messages calling them “selfish” and demanding more taxes.

Lee Sung-jae, a 75-year-old resident of Seoul, said it was the “order of nature” for people to marry and have children. “These days I see (unmarried) young women walking with dogs in strollers and saying they are their children. Were those dogs born? They are really crazy,” he said.