Employment and Motherhood

Employment and Motherhood Entry in South Korea, 1978-2006
Li Ma
In Population Volume 68, Issue 3, 2013, pages 419 to 446
ISSN 0032-4663
ISBN 9782733201725
This document is the English version of:

Li Ma, «Emploi et première maternité en Corée du Sud, 1978-2006», Population 2013/3 (Vol. 68) , p. 419-446
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Li Ma, «Emploi et première maternité en Corée du Sud, 1978-2006», Population 2013/3 (Vol. 68) , p. 419-446
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
Li Ma*
Employment and Motherhood Entry

in South Korea, 1978-2006
Numerous European studies conducted since the 1980s have examined
female employment and fertility, finding a positive link in some cases,
and a negative link in others, depending on the country and the period
under study. Social policies and economic context, gender relations
and family norms all play a role in this complex fertility-employment
relationship, and explain the variability observed. In this article, Li Ma
presents original new findings for South Korea, a country with one
of the world’s lowest levels of fertility: just 1.15 children per woman
in 2009. Using longitudinal data covering the last three decades and
event history models, the author shows that women’s employment and
motherhood entry are increasingly interlinked, implying a shift away
from the family norms that prevailed in South Korea until recently.
Alongside these notable social changes, women’s rising educational
level and their employment conditions – more specifically employment
security – are decisive for reconciling first birth and continued labour
force participation.

Recent decades have seen an increasing body of research addressing the
relationship between women’s employment and their childbearing behaviour,
with most research addressing the contemporary situation in western countries.
This article draws attention to the case of South Korea (or Korea). Korea is a
rapidly developing country in East Asia that offers a very compelling context
for a study on female employment and motherhood entry. While economic
and demographic developments since the 1980s have been very swift, its welfare
system still relies on familistic principles.
Labour force participation and fertility are two central aspects of women’s
lives, and the relationship between them has been an important topic in recent
social science research. Female labour force participation rates (FLFPR) and
*Stockholm University Demography Unit, Sweden.

Correspondence: Li Ma, Department of Sociology, Demography Unit, Stockholm University, Univer-
sitetsvägen 10B, 106 91 Sweden, email: li.ma@sociology.su.se
Population-E, 68 (3), 2013, 419-446 DOI: 10.3917/pope.1303.0419

Li Ma
total fertility rates(1) (TFR) from 21 OECD countries reveal that the aggregate
relationship between employment and fertility was negative before the 1980s.
But since then it has been positive, and even strongly positive since the 1990s
(Brewster and Rindfuss, 2000). In countries where the conflict between women’s
work and family responsibilities has eased, positive employment-fertility
relationships occur. In countries where women are still forced to decide between
employment and family life, negative relationships remain (Brewster and
Rindfuss, 2000; Rindfuss et al., 2003).
At the individual level, positive associations have been documented for
Nordic countries with a universalistic welfare regime (Hoem, 1990; Sundström
and Stafford, 1992; Bernhardt, 1993; Andersson, 2000; Hoem, 2000; Oláh,
2003; RØnsen, 2004; Vikat, 2004; Andersson, 2008; Lappegård, 2010). For
example, Swedish family policies supporting women’s labour force participation
and promoting gender equality are arguably related to the country’s relatively
high fertility. Another example is France, where the context is also relatively
favourable to reconciling work and childrearing (Thévenon, 2009). In contrast,
in countries with conservative and familistic welfare regimes, like Germany
and Italy in Europe, negative employment-fertility relationships dominate.
These countries encourage a more traditional gender division of work and care,
and usually offer less policy support to enable women to reconcile work and
family life (Matysiak and Vignoli, 2008). Régnier-Loilier and Vignoli (2011)
find that the obstacles to parenthood are strong in Italy due to the absence of
institutional support for working mothers. Across Europe, a pattern emerges
where decisions to have a child depend on whether a birth can be reconciled
with employment (Thévenon, 2009).
Apart from the role of institutional factors, the influence of economic cycles
on fertility and the employment-fertility relationship have also been examined.

For example, Sobotka et al. (2011) look at how the most recent economic
recession has affected fertility in the developed world. Rindfuss et al. (1988)
and Lee (1990) argue that fertility decline during recession is temporary; it
may be recuperated after economic recovery. Different individuals may respond
differently to economic recessions. Some women may refrain from childbearing,
while others may see this period as an opportunity for pregnancy as their
career expectations are disrupted (Macunovich, 1996). For women with low
educational level and income, when difficult economic conditions lower their
chances of getting a good job, becoming a parent may serve to reduce uncertainties
in their life situation (Friedman et al., 1994; Kreyenfeld, 2010). Thévenon and
Gauthier (2011) point to the protective role of public policy for fertility during
economic recession, particularly the provision of parental leave with job
protection and income compensation.
(1) Total fertility rate indicates the number of children that would be born to a woman over her
lifetime if she were to experience the current period age-specific fertility rates (ASFRs) throughout
her childbearing years.
420
From an individual-level perspective, Kreyenfeld et al. (2012) summarize

how economic and employment uncertainties are related to fertility and family
dynamics across Europe. On the whole, the association between employment
status, employment stability and fertility differs by country. In western Germany,
occupational uncertainty (part-time working or fixed-term contract) hampers
transition to parenthood (Schmitt, 2012). In France, women with a temporary
employment contract are less likely to have a child than those with a permanent
contract (Régnier-Loilier and Vignoli, 2011). In Sweden, young people are in
a similar situation, and people who are not in the labour force have the lowest
intensity of first births; this holds for women as well as for men (Lundström
and Andersson, 2012). In Italy, non-working women have higher first-birth
rates than employed women (Santarelli, 2011). For Kreyenfeld et al. (2012),
there is no simple answer to how economic uncertainty affects fertility, since
social policies and institutional factors mediate the relationship.
Most research dealing with the employment-fertility relationship focuses
on developed countries in the West. Relevant knowledge is scarcer for the
eastern world. This article improves on this situation by focusing on South
Korea and the patterns of motherhood entry in that country. There are two
strong reasons for concentrating on Korea. First, Korea’s economy has grown
at a remarkable speed over the past five decades. Before the 1960s, its industrial
economy was still largely undeveloped (Jones and Leete, 2002). But beginning
in the 1960s, together with several other countries in East and South East Asia,
Korea created the region’s economic “miracle” (Rauhala, 2012). Thanks to its
rapid development, Korea was granted membership of the OECD in 1996.
Though hard hit by the 1997 Asian financial crisis, its GDP recovered to its
pre-crisis level in 2002.
Secondly, Korea’s economic development has occurred in conjunction with

profound social and demographic changes. Education has expanded at a rapid
pace; marriage and childbearing have been delayed; pre-marital cohabitation
has become more common (though extramarital births are still rare); women
have become more strongly attached to the labour force and have gained
increasing economic and social independence; and the nation has experienced
one of the sharpest fertility declines among OECD countries, with a TFR that
plummeted from 5.0 in 1965 to 1.15 in 2009. According to Lesthaeghe (2010),
Korea seems to have joined the second demographic transition (SDT), exhibiting
all its features except one (nonmarital childbearing).
Section I of this article begins with an account of the socioeconomic,
demographic and institutional contexts of South Korea, followed by a presentation
of data and methods in Section II. Section III demonstrates and discusses the
main results of the study; the conclusion section summarizes the main findings
and discusses research and policy implications.
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I. Socioeconomic, demographic
and institutional contexts of Korea
Rapid economic development and profound demographic change

Korea has experienced profound social and economic change over the past
decades. Its economic development occurred relatively late compared with
other OECD countries, but at a rapid pace. Figure 1 shows that Korea’s gross
domestic product (GDP) increased steadily and rapidly from the early 1980s
to the late 1990s. However, this regular trend was interrupted in 1997 by the
Asian financial crisis, which began with the economic meltdown of Thailand
and quickly spread to other countries in Asia. Korea’s unemployment rates
skyrocketed in 1998 and its GDP had nowhere to go but down. The whole of
society was rocked by social unrest. It was not until 2002 that the country
returned to economic growth. Thereafter, its economy took off and escalated
again until 2008, when Korea was hit by another wave of economic recession.
Figure 1. Gross domestic product (GDP) and unemployment rate in Korea,

1980-2011
Unemployment rate (%) GDP (USD billion)
8 1200
7 GDP
Unemployment rate 1000
800
5
4 600
3

400
200
1
INED
087A13
0 0
1980 1985 1990 1995 2000 2005 2010
Source:International Monetary Fund, World Economic Outlook Database, April 2011.
Korea’s economic development has been accompanied by substantial

demographic change. Figure 2 shows the TFRs of a few selected OECD countries,
all of which were experiencing fertility decline by the mid-1960s. One after
another, their TFRs dropped to below replacement level. Korea stands out as
the country with the sharpest decline in fertility, from 5.0 in 1965 to 1.47 in
2000. The level of 1.3 reached in 2001 marks the onset of Korea’s “lowest-low”
fertility era, and in 2005 Korea’s TFR fell to an all-time low of 1.08. Since then,
its TFR has lingered below 1.3.
Korea’s fertility decline can be attributed to a combination of factors. For
Choe and Retherford (2009), the family planning programme initiated in 1962
422
Figure 2. Period total fertility rate (TFR) of Korea compared

with those of other selected OECD countries, 1965-2009
TFR
5.0
INED
088A13
4.5
4.0
South Korea
3.5
3.0
France
2.5 United States
Replacement level
2.0
1.5 Japan
Germany
Sweden
1.0
1965 1970 1975 1980 1985 1990 1995 2000 2005 2010
Source:OECD (2012a).
was the main driving force behind the onset of fertility decline. In the 1950s
and 1960s, Korea was a country with rapid population growth, high population
density, high fertility and a largely undeveloped industrial economy (Jones
and Leete, 2002). As in many other Asian countries, its growing population
was viewed as an obstacle to economic development. In 1962, the government
implemented a family planning programme to control population growth
(Rhee, 2007). An integral part of Korea’s national economic plan, this programme
aimed to reduce the number of unwanted births and to reduce the ideal family
size to three children or fewer. In the early 1980s, new goals were set to lower
the ideal to two children, and to bring the TFR down to replacement level by

1988. The programme was abandoned after 1988, partly because these goals
had been achieved (Choe and Retherford, 2009; S-S Lee, 2009). According to
Jones (2007) and S-S Lee (2009), Korea’s fertility decline from the 1960s to the
1980s was mainly due to lower fertility within marriage. By contrast, the
continued decline down to very low fertility levels since the 1990s has largely
been driven by delayed marriage, a process closely connected with the expansion
of education.
Educational expansion, labour market entry

and family responsibilities of women
In 1975, only 20% of female high school graduates advanced to higher
education. This proportion increased to 34% in 1985, to 50% in 1995, and to
81% in 2005 (Choe and Retherford, 2009; Frejka et al., 2010). The key role of
educational expansion in Korea’s fertility decline is documented by Atoh et al.
(2004), Jones (2007, 2010), Kye (2008), Choe and Retherford (2009), Frejka et
al. (2010), and Anderson and Kohler (2013). For example, Jones (2010) reports
that women’s mean age at marriage increased from 24.1 years in 1980 to
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28.8 years in 2005. Kye (2008) shows that the influence of educational expansion
on postponement of first marriage has been strong. Once married, Korean
women have children quickly. High-educated women tend to marry and become
mothers later than low-educated women do.
From another perspective, researchers have documented the negative
influence on fertility of the cost of educating children. A good university
education is essential for attaining a well-paid and secure job in Korea (Seth,
2002; Eun, 2007; Choe and Retherford, 2009). Under the macro context of
educational expansion, many parents send their children to expensive private
tutoring or after-school learning institutes (or “cram schools”) to prepare them
for competitive college entrance exams.(2) The cost of educating children
discourages couples from having more than two (Anderson and Kohler, 2013).
Women’s high educational attainment does not necessarily bring them
high labour market rewards. Figure 3 shows men’s and women’s employment
rates(3) by age group and by calendar period in Korea. Although female
educational attainment has been increasing remarkably, the employment rates
of women aged above 25 are still much lower than those of men for all calendar
periods.(4) Nonetheless, with the rise of women’s educational levels, their labour
force participation has been gradually increasing, albeit at a slow pace. In sharp
contrast to men, a woman’s working career is curtailed at the primary
childbearing ages (25-34). Over time, Korean women’s labour force participation
behaviour has changed little: labour market entry followed by labour market
exit for family life and then labour market re-entry when their children need
less care.
The M-curved patterns indicate that for Korean women, temporarily
sacrificing their career at a certain stage of life for the sake of family formation
and expansion is entrenched in tradition. We can see that ages 25-29, once the

ages when most women left the labour market, have today become peak ages
for labour force involvement and the age at labour market exit has gradually
shifted to ages 30-34 (Figure 3). Women aged 25-29 have become more strongly
attached to the labour force after completing their education. The shift is closely
linked to prolonged schooling, delayed labour market entry and subsequent
postponement of family formation.
Although women have become more engaged in the labour force, gender
equality is not progressing in tandem. Families still follow conservative patterns
in terms of household chores and gender roles. Korean men see themselves as
the sole family breadwinner and women as the primary caregiver, holding the
(2) Cram schools used to be illegal in Korea as they were believed to promote social inequality. In
the 1990s, however, they received government approval and have exploded in popularity ever since
(Anderson and Kohler, 2013). According to OECD (2007), private after-school education can cost up
to about USD 25,000 per child per annum.
(3) The employment rate indicates the proportion in employment within a given population.
(4) According to Lee (1998) and Choe et al. (2004), female education in Korea mainly carries a
symbolic meaning; it is more useful for selecting a husband than for finding employment.
424
Figure 3. Employment rates by age group, calendar periods and gender,

South Korea, 1990-2011, (%)
Percentage
100
INED
089A13
90
Men
80
70
60
Women
50
40 1990-1995
1996-2000
2001-2005
2006-2011
30
20
20 25 30 35 40 45 50 55 60 65
Age
Source:OECD (2012a).
main responsibility for household chores and raising children. Hence, when
working women reach the life stage of family formation and expansion, both

society and their family expect them to leave the labour market and take
responsibility for providing care at home. A significant number of women
follow these expectations by temporarily sacrificing their career, irrespective
of the educational level they have attained. However, from the mid-1990s the
number of women who dropped out of the labour market at ages 25-34 started
decreasing, implying that some women may have started challenging these
expectations. After gaining economic independence, some women even tend
to forgo marriage and childbearing, as they are reluctant to give up paid work
for homemaking (Eun, 2007).
Institutional factors: labour market constraints and social policies

Korea’s demanding labour market conditions make it difficult for women
to reconcile work and family responsibilities. In Korea, long working hours
are part of corporate culture, as they demonstrate loyalty to one’s employer
(Choe et al., 2004). The average number of hours usually worked per week per
person in Korea is the highest of all OECD countries (OECD, 2012b). In 2000,
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Li Ma
Koreans worked 52 hours per week on average, well above the OECD average
of 40 hours. Though the figure had fallen to 45 hours in 2011, it was still higher
than the OECD average of 38.4 hours. In 2011, Koreans worked around eleven
more hours per week than Norwegians, seven more than the French and six
more than the Spanish. Besides, part-time employment is very rare and
opportunities to work flexible hours are almost non-existent. Moreover, until
the 1980s, women on the labour market were affected by discriminatory
practices based on their marital status. Single women could work as clerks,
manual workers or professionals, with job continuity only until marriage.
Married working women tended to be self-employed or to work for their family
(Lee 1998). In addition, Korea’s gender wage gap remains large. For full-time
employees, it has been the highest of all OECD countries since the 1990s
(OECD, 2012b). In such a context, women do not have much incentive to stay
in their jobs after family formation, and instead choose to assume care
responsibility at home.
Paid leave with job protection after childbirth, early childhood education
and childcare, and flexible working hours are the main OECD policy
recommendations to help women balance work and family life (OECD 2011),
and may have a decisive impact starting with the birth of the first child (Thévenon
and Gauthier 2011). However, the development of family policies has been rather
slow in Korea, and support to families and working parents is limited (Thévenon,
2011). Working flexible hours is almost impossible, and childcare provision and
early education services were far from sufficient before 2008. Korea was ranked
the worst, or one of the worst, among OECD countries in public expenditure on
childcare and early education services from 1998 to 2007 (OECD, 2012a). As of
2005, only 20% of children below three years of age had access to childcare
services,(5) and 68% of children aged 3-5 attended preschool (OECD, 2006). From

2008 onward, the Korean government made significant efforts to reduce the
burden of childrearing. In 2008 and 2009, 0.6% and 0.7% of the GDP (around
the OECD average) were invested in childcare and early education services
(OECD, 2012b, 2012c, 2012d). By 2008, the childcare enrolment rate for children
under three years old had increased to 38%, while 80% of children aged 3-5
attended preschool (OECD, 2012a).
As regards maternity leave, the rule of 60 days of unpaid leave remained
unchanged in Korea from 1953 to 2001. In 2001, women became entitled to
90 days of fully paid maternity leave (with 100% income compensation), with
the stipulation that at least 45 days of the leave should be used after childbirth
(K-H Lee, 2009; MOEL, 2011a, 2011b). Dismissal during maternity leave is
now prohibited; women have the legal right to return to the same or a similar
position (ILO, 2006). For women covered by employment insurance (for at
least 180 days), their employer covers the income compensation for the first
(5) In the same year, the childcare participation rate for children aged below three was 62% in
Denmark and 45% in Sweden.
426
60 days and the remaining 30 days are covered by the insurance (Kim, 2007;
Peng, 2009). Women with insurance coverage are usually those who hold stable
and regular employment positions.
From 2006 onward, employment insurance for employees in small- and
medium-sized companies was extended to cover the entire maternity leave
period (90 days). For insured women in large enterprises, the employer is still
responsible for two-thirds of the leave (Suzuki, 2008; K-H Lee, 2009; Peng,
2009; MOEL, 2011a). The upper limit of income compensation provided under
the insurance scheme has been 1.35 million KRW (around USD 1,000) per
month since 2001. For employees with no insurance coverage, the employer
should, in principle, take full responsibility for offering leave and benefits.
However, this is mainly a recommendation. In practice, financial constraints
often prevent employers from granting women their benefits (K-H Lee, 2009).
Unpaid parental leave was introduced in Korea in 1987. From 2001,
employees with employment insurance could enjoy parental leave with a flat-
rate compensation of 200,000 KRW (around USD 130) per month for 10.5 months,
in addition to the 90-days of fully paid maternity leave (Suzuki, 2008; Kim,
2007; Peng, 2009). Parental leave was also job-protected (ILO, 2006). The
financial support for parental leave in 2001 was equal to one-eighth of women’s
average income and one-tenth of men’s (K-H Lee, 2009). Consequently, women’s
uptake of parental leave was low and fathers’ uptake almost negligible (OECD,
2006). In 2011 the employment insurance started providing 40% of the
beneficiary’s usual wage for 12 months, rather than the previous flat rate
(MOEL, 2011a).
Compared with previous conditions, the family policy introduced in 2001,
including paid leave and job protection, was a significant improvement. However,
Korea still lags behind other developed countries in the development of its

social policies. In 2009, Korea ranked lowest among OECD countries for
expenditure on maternity and parental leave per child born (OECD, 2012d).
Traditional values and value change

Koreans have maintained many aspects of traditional family behaviour;
childbearing within marriage is one of them. The link between marriage and
fertility is very strong. Transitions to marriage and parenthood follow an orderly
pattern (Kye, 2008). Though cohabiting relationships are gaining popularity,
childbearing outside marriage is still not socially accepted. In Europe,
childbearing within cohabiting unions had spread from Scandinavia to the
rest of Western Europe by the 1980s (Lesthaeghe, 2010). As early as 1970, 7%
of births in France and 19% of births in Sweden occurred outside marriage.
In 2009, the proportion had increased to 53% and 55%, respectively (OECD,
2012a). In sharp contrast, the share of births outside marriage in Korea was
only 1.5% in 2009, the lowest among OECD countries (OECD, 2012a). In a
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Li Ma
context where childbearing is restricted to marriage, fertility may be depressed

if marriage is no longer a universal value.
Up to the 1980s, it was a woman’s obligation to marry and bear children
to perpetuate the family line. But since the 1990s, these once sacred concepts
have gradually lost ground. Marriage and childbirth are no longer universal
duties but have rather become a choice (S-S Lee, 2009). Drawing from the 1994
National Survey on the Quality of Life (NSQL) funded by the Korea Institute
for Health and Social Affairs (KIHASA), Bumpass and Choe (2004) discover
that younger cohorts show lower support for the position that marriage and
children are necessary for a full and satisfying life. Negative attitudes towards
marriage, childbearing and traditional gender roles are particularly pronounced
among younger women.
Value change among men might also affect women’s economic activity as well
as their childbearing behaviour. Korean men, who long adhered firmly to traditional
gender roles, may have started to realize the financial advantage of having a working
wife, especially after the financial crisis in 1997. Working women have recently
become more attractive on the marriage market, and working wives have become
more socially acceptable (Anderson and Kohler, 2013).
Research questions
Korea has enjoyed spectacular economic development in the past five decades.
At the same time profound social and demographic changes have occurred, such
as educational expansion, postponement of marriage, cohabitation before marriage,
women’s increasing labour force participation as well as pursuit of individual
autonomy and significant fertility decline. Like women in the West, Korean
women prefer to acquire work experience before considering childbearing; yet
demanding working conditions, historically-entrenched gender inequality in

both the public and family spheres, and the slow development of family policies
in Korea make it hard for women to reconcile work and family commitments.
With regard to the employment-fertility relationship in the context of
Korea, aggregated data show that the country’s TFR is negatively related to
female labour force participation. However, the profound socioeconomic,
demographic and institutional changes of recent decades seem to conceal some
more interesting underlying stories. In this study, I will examine the special
relationship between women’s employment and motherhood entry in the
context of Korea. Based on Korea’s specific context described above, I offer the
following research questions:
• How do the trend and intensity of first births evolve over time? What
are the factors that may help to shape this trend?
• How is women’s employment status related to motherhood entry? Do
women who have left the labour market have higher intensity of becoming
a parent than others do?
428
• For women currently employed as wage earners, how are job characteristics
related to motherhood entry?
• What is the role of recently introduced family policies in women’s entry
into motherhood?
II. Data and methods
Data used for the analyses in this study are from waves 1 to 10 of the Korea
Labor and Income Panel Study (KLIPS), Korea’s only labour-related panel
survey, initiated by the Korea Labor Institute. The first wave was conducted
in 1998 with an original sample of 5,000 households in urban areas. Direct
face-to-face interviews with the household reference person or the spouse were
carried out to collect information on household members aged above 15 years.
In limited special cases, other methods were used for data collection, such as
self-administered questionnaires or telephone interviews.
In the first survey, retrospective information on the demographic
characteristics of individuals aged above 15 in the household and their job
characteristics was collected. The survey was conducted annually to track
changes in characteristics of households as well as individuals. If an individual
within a household turned 15, or if an individual aged above 15 joined a sampled
household, he or she was included in the survey. New respondent data were
collected regarding retrospective information. If some household members
moved out and formed new families, the new household and its members were
tracked as well. The most recent accessible data are from wave 10, conducted
in 2007.
The greatest advantage of adopting KLIPS for this study is that, apart from

background information on individuals (such as birth date, childhood residence,
and educational attainment), it offers rich longitudinal data at the micro level,
such as employment history, civil status changes, and birth date of each child.
These important life-course episodes are essential factors for studying the
employment-fertility relationship. The disadvantage of using KLIPS is that the
sample consists of people living in urban areas at the time of interview, which
means that the findings do not represent Korea as a whole. Still, 83% of the
country’s population now lives in urban areas (United Nations, 2012).(6)
Event history analysis is used to examine the relationship between women’s
employment and motherhood entry. The observation window opens when a
woman turns 15, and the events are tracked prospectively in time and dated
monthly with “woman-months” as the unit of analysis. The observation window
closes at the time of first birth, the last interview or age 45, whichever comes
(6) Seoul, or the Seoul Special City, is the capital and largest city of South Korea. The Seoul National
Capital Area includes the Incheon metropolis and most of Gyeonggi province. Around half of Korea’s
population lives in the Seoul National Capital Area and almost a quarter in Seoul itself.
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Li Ma
first. Considering Korean women’s conventional practice of withdrawing from

the labour market for family life, nine months are subtracted from the date of
any reported first birth to capture the effect of pre-pregnancy employment
status and job characteristics on first-birth fertility. For respondents who
remain childless until the last interview time or age 45, nine months are also
subtracted to obtain a uniform sample. Hence, the dependent variable in this
study is the confirmed conception of the first live birth.(7)
The total sample for observation contains 7,338 women aged 15-44 during
the period 1978 to 2006,(8) among whom 3,370 conceived their first child during
the same period. I apply piecewise constant exponential models. The model
can be depicted as follows:
h(t|xj) = h0(t)exp (xjbx)
where h0 (t) represents the baseline hazard function, xj represents a vector of
explanatory and control variables used in the analysis, and bx the corresponding
vector of the regression parameters that indicate the effect of the variables.
Table 1 presents descriptive statistics of the prime explanatory variables
regarding the occurrence of events (conception of the first live birth) as well
as exposure time to the risk of first conception (woman-months as childless).
First and foremost is the time-varying variable calendar year; estimation of
this variable shows how the trend of motherhood entry varies over time. The
variable is categorized into six groups on a five-year basis. The period 1998-
2002 is set as the reference category, because this period indicates the aftermath
of the 1997 Asian financial crisis. The first four groups represent the time of
fast economic growth before the crisis, and 2003-2006 corresponds to the
economic recovery period after the crisis.
The second important explanatory variable is female employment status.

This is a time-varying covariate, containing three categories: never employed,
employed (reference), previously employed. This variable reveals whether
Korean women who have withdrawn from the labour market have a higher
intensity of first childbearing than the others.
For women currently in the labour force under the category of “employed”,
more detailed information on their work type is available. They may be wage
earners in the private or public sector, or non wage earners working for a family
business or in agriculture. The Korean public sector covers workplaces such
as schools, hospitals, state-owned enterprises, government or government
branches, government-related companies and foundations. This sector offers
the most stable job positions, and can also be regarded as a proxy for employment
stability. It can help us detect how motherhood entry by wage earners varies
(7) In this article, the term “conception of the first live birth” may be substituted with, “motherhood
entry”.
(8) The last survey wave was conducted around April to June 2007. Because timing was moved back
from first birth to first live conception, no events occur in 2007. For the same reason, the number of
events in 2006 is influenced by the nine-month subtraction.
430
Table 1. Women exposed to first birth risk(a)

and annual rate of first conception
Events Annual first
Woman-months
(first conception) conception rate
Number % Number % (%)
Calendar years
1978-1982 153,598 17 714 21 6
1983-1987 140,452 16 618 18 5
1988-1992 147,538 16 600 18 5
1993-1997 161,387 18 545 16 4
1998-2002 164,824 18 550 16 4
2003-2006 136,647 15 343 10 3
Employment status
Never employed 460,611 51 893 26 2
Employed 298,581 33 1,181 35 5
Wage earner-private 123,071 14 475 14 5
Wage earner-public 29,743 3 206 6 8
Wage earner-other 7,831 1 18 1 3
Non wage earner 52,781 6 175 5 4
Data missing 85,155 9 307 9 4
Previously employed 145,254 16 1,296 38 11
Total 904,446 100 3,370 100
(a) First conception leading to a live birth.
Note:“Woman-months” indicates the total number of months that women are exposed to the risk of becoming
a mother. “Events” indicates the total number of conceptions resulting in a first live birth.
Interpretation: Never-employed women were childless and not pregnant for 460,611 months. 893 never-
employed women conceived their first live child. Their annual conception rate for a first live child was thus 2%.
Source:KLIPS (1998-2007).
by employment stability, and may also provide indications of how the recently
introduced maternity/parental leave system may interact with women’s

propensity to become a mother.
Seven variables are used as control variables, among which three are time-
varying and four are time-fixed.(9) Woman’s age is presented by five-year age
groups between ages 15 and 44. It is the basic time factor of this study.
Women’s educational level is essential in this study, as its importance in
childbearing behaviour has been frequently documented. Given that Korea’s
school system is relatively uniform, following a standard system, women’s
educational history is based on the time they reported obtaining their final
educational qualification. Woman’s educational level is categorized into six
groups: still enrolled in education, elementary school, middle school, high
school, college, and university or above. The first category indicates the periods
when women were still enrolled in education. The latter groups indicate women’s
final educational attainment.
Fertility studies on East Asian countries often focus on married women.
However, with pre-marital cohabitation becoming more common, more children
(9) Descriptive statistics for these variables are shown in the Appendix Table.
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Li Ma
might be conceived outside marriage but born after marriage. To discern this
possible subtle change, we take into account all women at risk of becoming a
mother by creating a time-varying variable for marital status: singlehood, first
marriage, disrupted periods and later marriages. Around 34% of total events
(first conceptions) in our sample occur outside marriage and around 66% in
first marriages (Appendix Table). Expanding the study population to all women
at reproductive ages, rather than married women only, serves to reveal the
dynamics of motherhood entry both within and outside marriage. The remaining
background variables, including religion, childhood residence, father’s education
and mother’s education, are all time-fixed.
III. Findings and discussions
The various factors of entry into motherhood

Table 2 presents estimations from the main effects models in the form
of relative first-birth risks by calendar year, employment status and other
covariates. Model 1 – the simplest model – includes only the woman’s age
and calendar year to capture the unconditioned calendar year effects on the
likelihood of becoming a mother. In Model 2, employment status is included.
From Models 3 to 5, education, background factors and marital status are
added stepwise.
Table 2. Relative risks of motherhood entry estimated using different models,

South Korea 1978-2006
Model 1 Model 2 Model 3 Model 4 Model 5
Age group

15-19 0.09 *** 0.11 *** 0.35 *** 0.35 *** 0.57 ***
20-24 1 1 1 1 1
25-29 2.47 *** 2.14 *** 1.79 *** 1.80 *** 0.92 **
30-34 0.81 *** 0.71 *** 0.62 *** 0.63 *** 0.23 ***
35-39 0.14 *** 0.13 *** 0.12 *** 0.12 *** 0.04 ***
40-44 0.01 *** 0.01 *** 0.01 *** 0.01 *** 0.00 ***
Explanatory variables
Calendar years
1978-1982 2.05 *** 2.38 *** 2.20 *** 2.10 *** 1.38 ***
1983-1987 1.94 *** 2.13 *** 1.98 *** 1.90 *** 1.55 ***
1988-1992 1.76 *** 1.83 *** 1.76 *** 1.70 *** 1.45 ***
1993-1997 1.29 *** 1.34 *** 1.35 *** 1.34 *** 1.18 ***
1998-2002 1 1 1 1 1
2003-2006 0.68 *** 0.70 *** 0.64 *** 0.65 *** 0.77 ***
Employment status
Never employed 0.75 *** 0.95 0.96 0.78 ***
Employed 1 1 1 1
Previously employed 2.09 *** 2.14 *** 2.15 *** 1.36 ***
432
Table 2 (cont'd). Relative risks of motherhood entry estimated using different models,
Model 1 Model 2 Model 3 Model 4 Model 5
Control variables
Education
In education 0.04 *** 0.04 *** 0.04 ***
Elementary school 0.67 *** 0.61 *** 0.44 ***
Middle school 1.01 0.93 0.73 ***
High school 1 1 1
College 1.07 1.10 1.21 ***
University or above 1.17 ** 1.30 *** 1.39 ***
Religion
None 1 1
Buddhist 1.06 1.03
Protestant 1.03 1.02
Catholic 0.97 1.00
Other 0.99 1.13
Childhood residence
Seoul 1 1
Metropolitan area 1.19 *** 1.16 ***
Other province 1.36 *** 1.23 ***
Father’s education
Low 1 1
Middle 0.86 *** 0.89 ***
High 0.74 *** 0.76 ***
Mother’s education
Low 1 1
Middle 1.15 *** 1.13 **
High 1.01 1.03
Marital status

Single 0.14 ***
First marriage 1
Disrupted 0.23 ***
Later marriages 0.63
Constant 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.02
Number of women 7,338
Number of first
3,370
conceptions
Time at risk (months) 904,446
Log likelihood – 4,119.44 – 3,844.24 – 3,436.63 – 3,387.03 – 2,315.11
LR chi2 3,774.16 4,324.55 5,139.77 5,238.98 7,382.81
Prob > chi2 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00
Statistical significance:***: p ≤ 0.01, **: p ≤ 0.05, *: p ≤ 0.10.
Source:Estimations based on KLIPS.
An overall reduction of first-birth risks over calendar years is discerned

in Model 1. From Models 2 to 4, when employment status, education and
background factors are involved one after another, the gradient between calendar
year groups largely remains the same. When marital status is taken into
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Li Ma
consideration (Model 5), the difference between calendar year groups is

substantially reduced. The relatively weak decline over the first three year
groups (from 1978 to 1992) disappears. The later decline from the 1990s onward
is much smaller.
The results imply that the first-birth trend up to the early 1990s (Models
1-5) was largely due to stable marriage rates during that period. The family
planning programme, expansion of education and female labour force
participation did not strikingly affect first-birth fertility, although marriage
postponement and decline during the 1990s accentuated the trend. However,
marriage postponement or decline is not a sufficient explanation for the
consecutive decline in first births; other factors must be at play, too. Changing
social attitudes towards marriage and childbearing may need to be considered.
As discussed previously, the concepts of marriage and childbearing are no
longer universal values. Besides, the increasing cost of educating children
following the development of cram schools in the 1990s may have reduced
women’s childbearing intensity. Further, the Asian financial crisis that hit
Korea in 1997 brought uncertainty to people’s daily lives. Unsure of the future,
many Koreans postponed marriage and family formation, further exacerbating
the first-birth decline. Although Korea’s economy had returned to growth by
the years 2003-2006, first-birth risk remained at a low level.
Models 2 to 4 reveal clear differences in motherhood entry between women
of different employment status. Women who withdraw from the labour market
are more than twice as likely to become a mother than women who remain in
the labour force. Women with no employment experience at all are at rather
low risk of becoming a mother, implying that Korean women are less likely to
enter motherhood before obtaining labour market experience. When marital
status is included in Model 5, the difference between women who have left the

labour force and the other two groups is much smaller, but the pattern still
remains. The results suggest that leaving the labour market is a signal of family
extension; it is typical for Korean women to withdraw from the labour market
when anticipating motherhood.
The results for the control variables also deserve a brief discussion.
Differential effects of educational level on motherhood transition are discovered.
Women in education are at the lowest risk of becoming a mother. Among
women who have completed their education, women at college level or above
are most likely to become a mother. When marital status is held constant, the
pattern becomes even more distinct. Once married, the more highly educated
a woman, the more quickly she becomes a mother. The results reveal a selection
effect of education on motherhood entry. Highly educated women are more
likely to postpone marriage; but once married, they are more committed to
the prospect of motherhood than women with lower educational attainment.
Estimations of background factors show that while religion does not make
much difference to women’s first-time pregnancy, childhood residence does.
434
Women who grew up in metropolitan areas, especially in the Seoul National

Capital Area, are less likely to become mothers than women who grew up in
other provinces. Women who grew up in big cities may have had more
opportunities to envisage other life goals than the career of becoming a mother.
The educational attainment of a woman’s father is negatively associated with
her motherhood entry, while the influence of her mother’s education is not
clear. Compared to women in their first marriage, single women are at rather
low risk of entering motherhood. It is still apparent that pregnancy outside
marriage is not entirely uncommon in Korean society. As births in Korea
overwhelmingly occur in marriage, it can be inferred that a certain number
of births that occur in marriage are in fact conceived during premarital
singlehood. The estimation for disrupted periods and later marriages is uncertain
because there were few cases of these categories in our data.
Role of job characteristics

Table 3 presents the results of the Model 5B on the role of job characteristics
in first-time motherhood transitions. The effects of other covariates are similar
to those of Model 5 in Table 2, and are thus not shown again. The “employed”
category is expanded with information on whether women work in the “private”,
“public” or “other” sector.
Estimations show that among currently working wage earners, those
working in the public sector are more likely to become a parent than those
working in the private sector. This is expected. Women employed in the public
sector are usually protected by employment insurance, and their jobs are more
stable and regular. Besides, since 2001 they have had more opportunity than
Table 3. Relative risks of motherhood entry by type of employment,


Employment status Model 5B
Never employed 0.57 ***
Wage earner-private 0.76 ***
Wage earner-public 1
Wage earner-other(a) 0.68
Non wage earner 0.62 ***
Employed but data missing 0.68 ***
Previously employed 1.01
Number of women 7,338
Number of first conceptions 3,370
Time at risk (months) 904,446
Log likelihood – 2,303.08
LR chi2 7,406.89
Prob > chi2 0.000
(a)
This estimation is not statistically significant as there were only a limited number of cases.
Note:The control variables are the same as those of Model 5 given in Table 2.
Statistical significance:***: p ≤ 0.01, **: p ≤ 0.05, *: p ≤ 0.10.
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Li Ma
others to benefit from the three-month paid maternity leave and the additional
parental leave. Moreover, they are most often guaranteed their previous job or
one of similar status when they return to the labour market after childbearing.
Employment stability gives these women a sense of security to proceed with
childbearing without fear of losing their job. In order to determine how
motherhood entry by job characteristics has changed over time, we need to
study the results from the interaction models.
Interaction between employment status and motherhood entry

The interaction models with calendar year and woman’s employment status
are depicted in Figure 4. It presents relative risks of motherhood entry by
employment status and calendar period. The trends for women who quit their
job and those remaining in the labour force are practically unchanged during
the first three calendar periods, but decline for both these groups after the
early 1990s. The trend decline for quitters is constant and steep, while for
stayers it is relatively weak. During the 1980s, women who had left the labour
market had a strikingly higher likelihood of becoming a mother than did
women who remained in a job. This difference had almost disappeared towards
the end of the study.
These results show that when marriage and taking care of the family were
considered a woman’s main responsibilities, most women followed social
expectations to leave the labour market upon becoming a mother. However,
women’s growing labour market involvement in recent years is challenging
this traditional practice, and fewer women now give up work at an early stage
of family formation. Instead, women have become more likely to stay in
Figure 4. Interaction effect of employment status and calendar period


on motherhood entry, standardized for other factors,
South Korea (reference category: employed, 1998-2002)
Relative risk
2.5
INED
090A13
2.0
Previously employed
1.5
Employed
1.0
Never employed
0.5
0.0
1978 1983 1988 1993 1998 2003 2006
436
employment up to or during pregnancy. This may be one strategy used by

working women to reduce their opportunity costs of having children. Men’s
appreciation of the advantages of a working wife may also have contributed to
this new phenomenon.
In the late 1970s, women with no employment experience had relatively
high risks of becoming a mother, only slightly lower than those of women
who had left the labour force. However, since the early 1980s they have
become the group least likely to become a mother. This trend is continuous,
except for a slight reversal during the economic downturn in 1998-2002. The
results imply that with the educational expansion, the experience of becoming
a mother before obtaining employment experience has become less relevant.
The arrival of the financial crisis in the late 1990s seems to have influenced
these women’s life career. When the country’s economy turned sluggish and
the job market slipped into stagnation, instead of waiting in vain for a job
opportunity a group of women with no labour market experience opted to
become parents instead.
Figure 5 presents estimations of the interactive effect of calendar period
and workplace sector. The first-birth trend of public employees follows the
standard trend discovered in the first models: it remains relatively stable
during the 1980s and then declines steadily from the early 1990s onward. In
comparison, private-sector employees follow a different trend. During the
economic boom periods from the 1970s to the late 1990s, their first birth
intensity increased, before plummeting during the economic downturn of
1998-2002. It is apparent that women employed in the public sector, who hold
stable and more regular jobs, have a higher likelihood of motherhood entry
Figure 5. Interaction effect of employment sector and calendar period


on motherhood entry of currently employed wage earners, standardized for
other factors, South Korea (reference category: private sector, 1998-2002)
Relative risk
2.5
INED
090A13
Public sector
2.0
1.5
Private sector
1.0
0.5
0.0
1978 1983 1988 1993 1998 2003 2006
437
Li Ma
than have women working in the private sector. During the late 1970s and the
1980s the type of workplace made a great difference to motherhood transition,
but this difference gradually shrank to almost nothing during the period 1993-
1997 before re-emerging in the economic downturn after the 1997 financial
crisis.
The results suggest that employment stability has been an important
correlate of motherhood entry. For women in the public sector, it may give
them a sense of security in deciding to proceed with childbearing. Besides,
public employees may have been the main beneficiaries of the family policy
reform on maternity/parental leave introduced in 2001. By contrast, private
sector employees are less likely to enter motherhood; their childbearing
behaviour seems to be more sensitive to the business cycle.
A number of other interaction models were tested, but no evidence of
further interaction effects was found. For example, the interaction of employment
status, educational attainment and calendar year shows that once married,
more highly educated women are more likely to become a mother during most
of the observation time, irrespective of their employment status. Women’s job
characteristics were also specified with other variables, such as employed
women’s monthly income. This reveals that, all else being equal, high earners
are generally slightly more likely than other women to become a mother (these
results are not shown but are available upon request).
Conclusion
Research on employment and motherhood entry has mainly focused on

countries in the West. It demonstrates that relationships differ by context.

Social polices under different welfare regimes arguably mediate the relationships.
In the Nordic countries where social policies support women’s labour force
participation and make it easier to reconcile work and motherhood, the transition
to parenthood is not as difficult as in countries of Southern Europe where
women’s traditional role is upheld and institutional support for women’s work-
family balance is limited.
Based on individual-level data, this study explores the relationship between
employment and fertility in South Korea, a society whose welfare system
depends on the principles of familism. On the whole, patterns of motherhood
transition in Korea display features that are unique to Korea as well as
characteristics that are similar to those observed in the West.
A general decline in motherhood entry is discerned. When marital status
is taken into consideration it becomes clear that since the 1990s, marriage
postponement and decline have contributed to the decrease in first births over
the same period. In a society where childbearing is tightly bound to marriage,
decline of marriage for either voluntary or involuntary reasons contributes
438
strongly to lowering fertility, but this is not the only factor at play. Increased
costs of educating children, and the Asian financial crisis of the late 1990s
may also have depressed first births in the 1990s and thereafter.
Women who have left the labour market have a significantly higher first
birth intensity than do women still in the labour force and women with no
employment experience. Leaving the labour market at an early stage of family
formation has been a common practice, especially during the 1970s and 1980s.
However, this practice has been challenged in recent years, and staying in the
labour force until and during pregnancy has started gaining prevalence. During
the 1970s and 1980s, marriage and childbearing were highly valued concepts;
it was women’s essential duty to carry on the husband’s family line. Traditional
gender roles prevailed and, under Korea’s familistic welfare regime, women
were expected to assume responsibility for household chores and to provide
care to the old and young. Leaving the labour market upon family formation
was socially expected. However, women have become increasingly economically
independent in recent years, so giving up career opportunities for domestic
roles at an early stage of family life may have become more difficult. Some opt
to keep working up to and during pregnancy to minimize the potential
opportunity cost. Men’s acknowledgement of the value of a working wife,
especially after the outbreak of the financial crisis, is also a likely contributor
to this new phenomenon.
Among wage earners, women employed in the public sector, who usually
hold more stable and regular employment positions, have higher motherhood
entry rates than women working in the private sector. This pattern holds
throughout our observation period. The results suggest that employment
stability has been of great importance to motherhood entry in Korea. Further,
the recently introduced maternity/parental leave with income compensation

and job protection may have supported public employees’ motherhood
transitions. Women employed in the private sector have relatively lower risks
of becoming a mother; their childbearing behaviour is more sensitive to the
business cycle. These findings resemble those of some developed countries in
the West such as the Nordic countries and France in Europe, implying that
employment stability provides women with a sense of security to proceed with
childbearing.
In many respects, Korea’s family policy development has been slow. Among
the three policy pillars promoted by the OECD to help women reconcile work
and family responsibilities (paid leave after childbirth with job protection,
childcare services, and opportunities to work flexible hours), Korea’s progress
has been far from sufficient. Since 2008, however, childcare services have been
considerably expanded and leave benefits have increased. These welfare
improvements may have made it easier for women to reconcile work and family
responsibilities in Korea. However, the data used in this study only continue
to 2007. To get a more complete picture of the employment-fertility relationship
439
Li Ma
in Korea, further research is needed. For this to happen, additional data must
be collected for this very crucial period of social change in Korea.
The relationship between employment and fertility is complex. This study
addresses only one direction of this relationship in the context of Korea. In
recent years, Korean women’s labour force attachment has become increasingly
strong. Women who become mothers are struggling over whether, and when,
to return to the labour force. This is another issue to be addressed in future
research.
Acknowledgements:I would like to express my sincere gratitude to Gunnar Andersson

for his constant advice during the development of this study. Great thanks also go to
Gerda Neyer, Elizabeth Thomson, Minja Choe, James Raymo, Jan Hoem, Ann-Zofie
Duvander, Jungho Kim, and my colleagues at the Stockholm University Demography
Unit for their comments and discussions. I would also like to express appreciation to
the anonymous reviewers, whose valuable comments and suggestions improved my
manuscript. An earlier version of the paper benefited from comments by participants
at the IUSSP International Seminar on “Patterns of Economic Development, Social
Change and Fertility Decline in Comparative Perspective: Analysis and Policy
Implications” in Shanghai, May 25-28, 2012.
440
Appendix

Li Ma
Women exposed to the risk of first conception.

Descriptive statistics of control variables
Person-time Events
Woman-months % First conceptions %
Woman's age
15-19 271,453 30 119 4
20-24 276,765 31 1,312 39
25-29 151,084 17 1,604 48
30-34 74,428 8 282 8
35-39 63,607 7 48 1
40-44 67,109 7 5 0
Education
In education 287,991 32 27 1
Elementary school 109,329 12 255 8
Middle school 89,264 10 457 14
High school 277,660 31 1,717 51
College 60,541 7 374 11
University or above 79,661 9 540 16
Religion
None 411,840 46 1,418 42
Buddhist 197,639 22 826 25
Protestant 207,780 23 804 24
Catholic 75,634 8 276 8
Other 11,553 1 46 1
Childhood residence
Seoul 312,410 35 917 27
Metropolitan areas 171,737 19 582 17
420,299 46 1,871 56

Other provinces
Father’s education
Low 411,201 45 1,850 55
Middle 376,605 42 1,210 36
High 116,640 13 310 9
Mother’s education
Low 659,667 73 2,729 81
Middle 222,526 25 603 18
High 22,253 2 38 1
Marital status
Single 656,846 73 1,135 34
First marriage 230,850 26 2,224 66
Disrupted 16,126 2 9 0
Later marriages 624 0 2 0
Total 904,446 100 3,370 100
Source:KLIPS (1998-2007).
442

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Li Ma
Li Ma •Employment and Motherhood Entry in South Korea , 1978-2006

This study uses event history analysis to explore the relationship between women’s employment and motherhood
entry in the socioeconomic and institutional context of South Korea. Data used for analysis come from waves 1
to 10 of the Korea Labor and Income Panel Study (KLIPS) collected between 1998 and 2007. The study shows that
motherhood entry declines during the study period, particularly from the 1990s onward, with marriage
postponement and decline arguably contributing to this downtrend. Women who leave the labour market are
more likely to become mothers than working women and women with no employment experience. Labour
market withdrawal is a signal of family formation and extension. However, this practice has been challenged in
recent years, and staying at work up to and during pregnancy has gained prevalence. Among wage earners,
women employed in the public sector are more likely than others to become a mother, underlying the importance
of employment stability for motherhood entry in Korea. The fertility behaviour of private-sector employees
appears to be sensitive to changes in the business cycle.
Li Ma •Emploi et première maternité en Corée du Sud, 1978-2006

Cet article analyse la relation entre l’emploi des femmes et l’entrée en maternité dans le contexte socioéconomique
et institutionnel de la Corée du Sud, à partir des données des vagues 1 à 10 du Korea Labor and Income Panel
Study (KLIPS) recueillies entre 1998 et 2007. L’étude retrace les comportements de fécondité et d’emploi depuis
1978 en ayant recours à la méthode de l’analyse biographique. L’entrée en maternité se caractérise par une
tendance à la baisse, surtout à partir des années 1990. Elle est notamment liée au report et à la diminution des
mariages. Les femmes qui quittent leur emploi sont davantage susceptibles de devenir mères que celles qui
restent actives ou n’ont pas eu d’expérience professionnelle. Le fait de sortir du marché du travail est souvent le
signe de constitution de la famille, mais ce phénomène est remis en cause dans les dernières années. Désormais,
rester en activité jusqu’à la grossesse et pendant celle-ci est plus fréquent. Les salariées du secteur public sont
davantage susceptibles que les autres de devenir mères, soulignant ainsi l’importance de la stabilité de l’emploi
pour l’entrée en maternité en Corée. Le comportement de fécondité des salariées du secteur privé paraît plus
sensible aux bouleversements des cycles économiques.
Li Ma •Empleo y primera maternidad en Corea del Sur, 1978-2006

Este articulo utiliza el análisis biográfico para estudiar la relación entre el empleo femenino y la primera maternidad,
en el contexto socioeconómico e institucional de Corea del Sur, a partir de los datos de las olas 1 a 10 del Korea
Labor and Income Panel Study (KLIPS), colectados entre 1998 y 2007, y que han permitido seguir los comportamientos
de fecundidad desde 1978. Las primeras maternidades disminuyen a lo largo del periodo, en particular a partir
de los años 1990. Esta baja está probablemente asociada a la desafección creciente por el matrimonio y a su
aplazamiento. Las mujeres que abandonan su actividad profesional son más susceptibles de devenir madres que
las que siguen activas o que nunca han trabajado. La salida del mercado de trabajo es un signo de formación de

la familia y de su extensión. Pero este comportamiento ha sido cuestionado en los últimos años, pues conservar
la actividad profesional hasta el embarazo e incluso durante éste, se ha hecho más frecuente. Las mujeres
asalariadas del sector público llegan a ser madres más frecuentemente que las otras, lo que pone de manifiesto
la importancia de tener un empleo estable para tener hijos. El comportamiento de fecundidad de las mujeres
empleadas en el sector privado es sensible a los cambios del ciclo económico.
Keywords:motherhood entry, employment status, job characteristics, social policy,

South Korea.
446

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