Only 36% of Youth Are 'Positive About Marriage'... 28% Women, 43% Men

20% Point Decline Compared to 10 Years Ago
'Lack of Marriage Funds' Cited as the Most Common Reason

Only one out of three young people viewed marriage positively. More than half of the youth believed that having children is unnecessary even if they get married.

According to the 'Changes in Youth Awareness through Social Surveys' released by Statistics Korea on the 28th, only 36.4% of young people viewed marriage positively as of May last year. This is a decrease of 20.1 percentage points compared to 56.5% in 2012, ten years ago. Notably, this is 13.6 percentage points lower than the proportion of the entire population who view marriage positively (50.0%).

The proportion of young people who view marriage positively was 28.0% for women and 43.8% for men, each down by 18.9 and 22.3 percentage points respectively compared to ten years ago. By age group, the figures were 34.0% for ages 19?24, 36.1% for ages 25?29, and 39.2% for ages 30?34.

The main reason young people cited for not marrying was lack of marriage funds (33.7%). This was followed by 'not feeling the need to marry' (17.3%), 'burden of childbirth and child-rearing' (11.0%), 'unstable employment status' (10.2%), and 'not meeting a marriage partner' (9.7%). The proportion citing lack of marriage funds was higher among men (40.9%) than women (26.4%).

As many as 80.9% of young people believed that men and women can live together even without marriage. This is 19.1 percentage points higher than ten years ago.

53.5% of young people responded that it is acceptable not to have children even if they get married. This proportion has steadily increased from 46.4% in 2018 and 50.5% in 2020.

Among young people who expressed satisfaction with their relationship with their parents and those satisfied with their overall family relationships, the proportion who responded that 'children should be born after marriage' was 57.6% and 57.1%, respectively, higher than the overall youth group (46.5%).

The proportion of young people who think it is better to divorce if there is a reason increased by 11 percentage points to 24.1% compared to ten years ago.

Regarding international marriage, 83.3% of young people responded positively, an increase of 9.5 percentage points compared to ten years ago.

The response that the family should be responsible for the parents' old age was 20.6%, down 12.6 percentage points from ten years ago. 60.7% believed that family, society, and government should jointly be responsible for parents' old age, while 15.0% answered that parents should handle it themselves.

The most important factors young people considered when choosing a job (as of 2021) were income (35.8%), stability (22.1%), aptitude and interest (19.1%), and working environment (9.8%). Preferred workplaces changed from 2011, when national institutions (27.7%), large corporations (19.6%), and public enterprises (19.3%) were favored, to 2021, when public enterprises (23.2%), national institutions (20.8%), and large corporations (20.2%) became the order of preference.

Both young men and women regarded childcare burden (46.3%) as the biggest obstacle to women's employment. This was followed by social prejudice (18.5%) and unequal working conditions (13.8%). The proportion of young people who wanted women to maintain employment regardless of childbirth and child growth increased by 20.8 percentage points to 74.0% compared to ten years ago (53.2%).