South Korea is at a demographic tipping point that is making it even more important to address the gender inequality that is discouraging millions of women from working.
With the nation’s workforce projected to begin a steady decline after peaking this year, the gap between the labor force participation rate for women (53.1 percent) and men (74.5 percent), looks like a critical weak point for the economy.
South Korean President Moon Jae-in acknowledged the issue when he urged parliament to approve his plan for an extra budget that includes training for women returning to work after maternity leave and funding to help women with start-up companies.
“The discontinuity in women’s careers is a loss for the nation,” he told lawmakers on June 12.
The drop in the female participation rate is severe for women in their 30s as they marry and have children and too few of them return to employment after family life settles down.
There is also a big issue with the quality of jobs held by women, with too many of them in non-regular positions, which means temporary and part-time jobs that typically come with lower wages. This in turn reduces their incentive to remain in the workforce.
Women exceeded men in numbers of new college graduates last year, according to Korean Educational Development Institute data.
This helps put them ahead their 20s, when compulsory military service interrupts men, before things change in their 30s.
While the law prohibits employers using gender-based pay scales, in practice, they often end up earning a lot less than men.
While Moon makes efforts to better balance his ministers, the board rooms of corporate South Korea remain a male domain.
Only 2.5 percent of board seats in the nation are held by women, a ratio that ranked it second-to-last in a Deloitte survey of 44 countries.
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