Instagram partly responsible for Korea’s record fertility rate, star speaker says

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June 16, 2023

SEOUL — A diagnosis by star math professors of South Korea’s continuing drop in births, attributing some of the blame to Instagram overflowing with flexible posts, went viral on Thursday.

In a video clip, uploaded to his YouTube channel, apparently from a lecture, Chung Seung-je shares his thoughts on the matter, starting with a question, Koreans had more babies in the past when they were much older. poor. Things are a lot better now, but why are people having fewer babies?

When we were young, we didn’t know about omakase restaurants and golf outings. Because we didn’t have Instagram, he said, criticizing a social media trend in which people brag about their success through lavish and ostentatious consumption.

Chung then told his students not to believe what they saw on Instagram.

These kinds of messages make you think that others are better off than you. It makes you feel like you’re the only one unhappy or unable to raise children like everyone else does.

The remarks by Chung, who specializes in preparing students for the college entrance exam and is one of Korea’s highest-paid lecturers, were echoed by many online users, especially young couples in their twenties and thirties.

A Twitter user, revealing that he or she recently got married, shared, Whenever I see celebrities raising their children in a luxurious apartment with a view of the Han River and sending them to expensive private English kindergartens , I’m afraid to have babies because I don’t think I will be able to provide as much as others do for my child.

Korea’s fertility rate fell from 0.81 in 2021 to a new low of 0.78 last year, the lowest among member states of the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development.

At a public hearing in March, hosted by the Department of Health and Welfare, participants in their 20s and 30s cited a culture of constantly comparing themselves to others as one of the reasons why young people don’t want to start a family and have babies.

Other reasons given for the nation’s chronically low birthrate include economic hardship, including housing problems, as well as the burden of childcare faced by dual-career couples.

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