‘Fertility rate 0.80’ rebound, the flip side···Opportunities to become parents were not shared evenly - 경향신문

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Mr. A, who works at a securities firm in Seoul, got married last March. With help from his parents for a 200 million won jeonse deposit, he was able to move up the wedding earlier than planned. He is also expecting his first child this fall. Mr. A said, “Once the housing issue was resolved, there was no reason to delay marriage,” adding, “We naturally began to think about having a baby.”

Mr. B, a truck driver in Gwangju, South Jeolla Province, married three years ago. Because his income is volatile and it is hard to get help from his parents, he keeps postponing having a child. Mr. B said, “When I see my wife pressing ‘like’ on fetal ultrasound photos on social media, I feel bad, but there is nothing I can do,” adding, “It feels as if having a child is becoming more and more out of reach for me.”

Although the total fertility rate (the average number of children a woman is expected to have over her reproductive years) has risen for two consecutive years, analysis shows the uptick is concentrated among some thirtysomethings with financial means and among the relatively large cohort born in the 1990s. This raises cautions against assuming the low-birth trend has been broken. Experts advise that the government should design marriage support alongside childbirth and childcare policies to draw young people of childbearing age into marriage.

According to reporting compiled on the 19th, the Ministry of Data and Statistics’ “2025 Births and Deaths Statistics (Provisional)” put last year’s total fertility rate at 0.80. Following 0.72 in 2023 and 0.75 in 2024, it rose again. The number of births also climbed to 254,500, up 16,100 (6.8%) from the previous year, the biggest increase in 15 years. The government called it “a rebound created by policy synergy and changing perceptions.”

However, a closer look at birth-related data suggests that the past two years of increases are closer to a temporary rebound in the absence of structural change, making it hard to view them as an established upward trend.

A report released in January by the Low Fertility and Aging Society Committee, “Key Characteristics and Causes Behind the Recent Fertility Rebound” (principal investigator Gye Bong-oh, professor at Kookmin University), found that since 2024 the rebound has been led by “already-married, relatively well-off thirtysomethings.”

The direct channel was a rise in fertility among women in their 30s with spouses. Their increase lifted the total fertility rate by 0.04 between 2023 and 2024, exceeding the overall rise of 0.03. In other groups, including those in their 20s, fertility rates fell; the surge among already-married women in their 30s was steep enough to more than offset those declines.

That rise, however, split again by income. Analyzing health insurance administrative data, the report estimated that the total fertility rate of the top 30% by income rose from 0.84 in 2023 to 0.95 in 2025. In contrast, the bottom 30% showed no clear rebound, with only a modest easing in the pace of decline.

The same pattern appeared in marriage. According to analysis by Gye’s team, the spouse-present rate among low-income people aged 3539 kept falling, while higher-income groups maintained a stable level. Yu Hye-jung, head of the Population Research Center at the Korea Future Population Institute, explained, “Because the share of nonmarital births is small in Korea, marriage is effectively a prerequisite stage for childbirth,” adding, “Gaps at the marriage stage can translate into gaps in opportunities to have children.”

Taken together, the recent rebound looks less like a broad influx of new young people because the thresholds for marriage and childbirth were lowered, and more like an increase in births among already-married thirtysomethings with an economic base. Lee Cheol-hee, a professor in the Department of Economics at Seoul National University, said, “The fertility-rate rebound may be the result of people who had the means but had been hesitating deciding to move,” adding, “In that case, it is difficult to see this as a fundamental, medium- to long-term trend reversal of low birthrates.”

In fact, the fertility rate has rebounded temporarily in the past only to fall again. The total fertility rate rose from 1.08 in 2005 to 1.30 in 2012, then fell to 1.19 the following year. After 2015, it entered a long-term decline. Experts say a ‘deferral effect’postponed marriages and births happening laterplayed a role, but because basic conditions that make marriage and childbirth difficult, such as housing, jobs, and education costs, did not change, the upswing could not be sustained.

The problem is that time-limited factors are again at work in the recent rebound, as before. These include a ‘deferral effect’ from the COVID-19 pandemic period and a ‘demographic effect’ as the relatively large 1990s-born cohort enters prime ages for marriage and childbirth. Yu said, “The 1990s-born are the last generation with a relatively large number of potential mothers,” adding, “As they join the ranks of marriage and childbirth, the total number of births can increase temporarily.”

However, this so-called ‘1990s-born effect’ is unlikely to last long. Even those born from 1996 to 1998 formed sizeable cohorts, but just a few years later, in 2001, annual births fell below 600,000, and in 2002 even the 500,000 mark was broken.

Lee Sang-rim, a senior researcher at the Population Policy Research Center at Seoul National University, explained, “Unless the total fertility rate jumps more than 25% from now, it will be hard to stop the total number of births from shrinking.” In other words, even if the total fertility rate rises, the actual number of babies born can fall if the number of women of childbearing age declines. This is also why it is difficult to say the recent rebound has broken the low-birth trend.

Ultimately, for the rebound to become a structural trend shift, the pool of young people newly entering marriage and childbirth needs to broaden. Yet current support measures are tuned to helping households alredy near the threshold for marriage and childbirth. A flagship measure, the special loan program for households with a newborn, targets those with certain levels of income, credit, and repayment capacity. Parental leave is also more accessible to employees with stable jobs.

Given this, marriage and childbirth can appear like lifestyle choices of groups with at least a certain level of economic means. Photos on social media of newlywed homes with a view of the Han River, babymoon trips, and postpartum care centers reinforce this perception. Lee said, “As marriages and births among young people who have received asset transfers from well-off parents stand out, there is also a trend toward seeing starting a family as a marker of a middle-class-or-higher life.”

Experts argue that to break the low-birth trend, policy must move away from concentrating benefits right before and after birth. Yu said, “If we focus only on childbirth support, it is difficult to draw young people into the preceding stage of marriage,” adding, “Marriage support and childbirth support need to be designed together.” Lee said, “Low birthrates arise because the life course of young peopleemployment, independence, marriage, childbirthis blocked,” adding, “Unless jobs, housing, and even the education structure change together, it will be hard to turn the current rebound into lasting change.”