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I see little emphasis in this article on real estate or rents. Sure, the issues they raise are contributors, but housing issues are foundational for many of the

I see little emphasis in this article on real estate or rents. Sure, the issues they raise are contributors, but housing issues are foundational for many of the other problems they spend a lot of time on in the article. SK is more land-constrained than Japan. We're seeing family formation being negatively impacted in many areas of the world now due to high real estate prices. It's particularly acute in SK: https://www.latimes.com/world-nation/story/2023-04-11/in-seouls-piece-rooms-theres-not-even-enough-room-to-lay-down-inside-south-koreas-brutal-housing-crisis https://www.latimes.com/world-nation/story/2023-04-11/in-seo...

yoyoyo1122 3y ago
It's in the middle of the article: > Another economic factor in the falling birthrate is the rising price of real estate and a resulting increase in unmarried or late-marrying people. The tradition in Korea is for men to prepare a family home before marrying, and the rising cost of housing in recent years has thereby triggered a decline in marriage rates. The Bank of Korea recently enacted emergency interest rate hikes that brought down the price of condominiums, but the interest rate on mortgages has risen, keeping home ownership a distant dream for many.
- UncleOxidant 3y ago
  Ok, there's a bit of a mention there, but they don't seem to consider it the foundational issue. They mention education costs for several paragraphs - education costs would likely not be so high if real estate costs weren't so high. Fewer desireable/high paying jobs gets several paragraphs, but again, this would be less of a problem if rents weren't so high - people would be able to live on the incomes available. High real estate prices are sucking the oxygen out of the rest of the economy.
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
Tade0 3y ago
It's there. Relevant fragment: > Another economic factor in the falling birthrate is the rising price of real estate and a resulting increase in unmarried or late-marrying people. The tradition in Korea is for men to prepare a family home before marrying, and the rising cost of housing in recent years has thereby triggered a decline in marriage rates.
davidktr 3y ago
ctrl+f "real estate" "Another economic factor in the falling birthrate is the rising price of real estate and a resulting increase in unmarried or late-marrying people. The tradition in Korea is for men to prepare a family home before marrying, and the rising cost of housing in recent years has thereby triggered a decline in marriage rates."
- globalise83 3y ago
  Not only the marriage rates. A much bigger property is needed for three children than for one, so even if poor old husband manages to scrape together enough for a one-bedroom apartment, there is a strong disincentive incentive to have two more children...
sho_hn 3y ago
Yes, housing is a pretty big factor. The textbook life you're supposed to lead in South Korea (and while South Korea is a very dynamic country that is always changing fast, for the moment, the expectation to adhere to norms and aspire to what your folks did is still a bit higher than you're perhaps used to) is to get married, move into a marriage home you bought - more on this in a moment - a couple of months to weeks before the ceremony to start co-habitation, and get busy having children. "Buying a home" in South Korea means either outright buying, or very commonly, living rent-free for the duration of a one- or multi-year contract after putting down a deposit that is usually 75% or more of the property value. This system is considered good and desirable, called Jeonse: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeonse https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeonse For numerous reasons, the Jeonse system is slowly getting dismantled. Monthly rent schemes are slowly becoming more and more prevalent. This is causing a big squeeze/run on the now-fewer good Jeonse apartments available, and giving many South Koreans the feeling that it's harder than ever to find a home to have, which is so intrinsically linked to this life milestone that for some, it puts getting married out of question. In addition to the above issue, which is meant as perceptual, it's also actually become economically more difficult to afford good housing. Some of this is very real and beyond the control of individuals, others is peer pressure to allocate money to e.g. luxury goods. Overall it's become tough on couples to afford housing and kids without both parents working very hard, which in turns makes child-rearing difficult to pull off; Korean employers and co-workers are still very hostile to workers with children (don't bring private issues to work, etc.). (I'm not Korean, but I've lived there for some years, can communicate in the language and read the news, and am married to a South Korean citizen with a child on the way; the latter is one of the reasons we moved away.)
rasz 3y ago
There are two modes of renting in Korea, one of them involves you paying Full market value to renter as a deposit! In theory you will get all of your money back at the end of lease. Renter invests this money into something, hopefully not another rental property seeing as they just had a mini real-estate crash. https://www.chicagobooth.edu/review/why-south-koreas-housing-market-is-so-vulnerable https://www.chicagobooth.edu/review/why-south-koreas-housing...

yoyoyo1122 3y ago

It's in the middle of the article: > Another economic factor in the falling birthrate is the rising price of real estate and a resulting increase in unmarried or late-marrying people. The tradition in Korea is for men to prepare a family home before marrying, and the rising cost of housing in recent years has thereby triggered a decline in marriage rates. The Bank of Korea recently enacted emergency interest rate hikes that brought down the price of condominiums, but the interest rate on mortgages has risen, keeping home ownership a distant dream for many.

UncleOxidant 3y ago
Ok, there's a bit of a mention there, but they don't seem to consider it the foundational issue. They mention education costs for several paragraphs - education costs would likely not be so high if real estate costs weren't so high. Fewer desireable/high paying jobs gets several paragraphs, but again, this would be less of a problem if rents weren't so high - people would be able to live on the incomes available. High real estate prices are sucking the oxygen out of the rest of the economy.

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]

Tade0 3y ago

It's there. Relevant fragment: > Another economic factor in the falling birthrate is the rising price of real estate and a resulting increase in unmarried or late-marrying people. The tradition in Korea is for men to prepare a family home before marrying, and the rising cost of housing in recent years has thereby triggered a decline in marriage rates.

davidktr 3y ago

ctrl+f "real estate" "Another economic factor in the falling birthrate is the rising price of real estate and a resulting increase in unmarried or late-marrying people. The tradition in Korea is for men to prepare a family home before marrying, and the rising cost of housing in recent years has thereby triggered a decline in marriage rates."

globalise83 3y ago
Not only the marriage rates. A much bigger property is needed for three children than for one, so even if poor old husband manages to scrape together enough for a one-bedroom apartment, there is a strong disincentive incentive to have two more children...

sho_hn 3y ago

Yes, housing is a pretty big factor. The textbook life you're supposed to lead in South Korea (and while South Korea is a very dynamic country that is always changing fast, for the moment, the expectation to adhere to norms and aspire to what your folks did is still a bit higher than you're perhaps used to) is to get married, move into a marriage home you bought - more on this in a moment - a couple of months to weeks before the ceremony to start co-habitation, and get busy having children. "Buying a home" in South Korea means either outright buying, or very commonly, living rent-free for the duration of a one- or multi-year contract after putting down a deposit that is usually 75% or more of the property value. This system is considered good and desirable, called Jeonse: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeonse https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeonse For numerous reasons, the Jeonse system is slowly getting dismantled. Monthly rent schemes are slowly becoming more and more prevalent. This is causing a big squeeze/run on the now-fewer good Jeonse apartments available, and giving many South Koreans the feeling that it's harder than ever to find a home to have, which is so intrinsically linked to this life milestone that for some, it puts getting married out of question. In addition to the above issue, which is meant as perceptual, it's also actually become economically more difficult to afford good housing. Some of this is very real and beyond the control of individuals, others is peer pressure to allocate money to e.g. luxury goods. Overall it's become tough on couples to afford housing and kids without both parents working very hard, which in turns makes child-rearing difficult to pull off; Korean employers and co-workers are still very hostile to workers with children (don't bring private issues to work, etc.). (I'm not Korean, but I've lived there for some years, can communicate in the language and read the news, and am married to a South Korean citizen with a child on the way; the latter is one of the reasons we moved away.)

rasz 3y ago

There are two modes of renting in Korea, one of them involves you paying Full market value to renter as a deposit! In theory you will get all of your money back at the end of lease. Renter invests this money into something, hopefully not another rental property seeing as they just had a mini real-estate crash. https://www.chicagobooth.edu/review/why-south-koreas-housing-market-is-so-vulnerable https://www.chicagobooth.edu/review/why-south-koreas-housing...