In Korea, wedding is as much burden to those family members of the couple who will tie the knot. (image: Kobiz Media / Korea Bizwire)
SEOUL, Dec. 17 (Korea Bizwire) — A man in his late 30s was arrested in Seoul on December 16 for habitual burglary breaking and entering houses in dozens of cases.
Upon investigation by the police it turned out he set out to steal to prepare funds for his wedding scheduled in April next year after failing in his business. It shows how hard it is for young men and women in Korea to get married without money.
Last month, the mother of a grown-up son lost a wad of cash hidden away for his upcoming wedding in her futon while shaking the dust off of it on her house rooftop. A group of policemen was mobilized to look for the lost money overnight and finally found the envelope full of 50,000-won bills on the lower-floor terrace.
Just like this happening, wedding is as much burden to those family members of the couple who will tie the knot.
According to a survey on single office workers whether they had postponed their marriage at least once, almost six out of ten (56.2%) said they did because of lack of enough money.
Saramin, a job portal, said this based on a survey held early this month. Others picked answers like “because I had no partner to get married to” (37.4%), “I had no time to date” (31.0%), “I don’t get paid enough to save for marriage” (29.6%), “My job is not so secure to think about marriage” (27.3%), “I have too much outstanding debt including student loan” (13.3%), “my fiance’s parents are not so affluent” (10.3%), “my parents are not rich enough to support my marriage” (9.6%).
This is no different for Japanese young men and women. More than a half of Japanese singles think their marriage will face obstacles, the biggest of which would be money.
In an article titled “Attitude toward Marriage and Child Caring of Japanese and Korean Young Men and Women” in the November issue of “Issue & Focus,” the magazine published by the Korea Institute for Health and Social Affairs, 50.7 percent and 65.1 percent of Korean and Japanese men think they will face problems when trying to get married. The corresponding figures for women in both countries were 49.0 percent and 68.4 percent.
The biggest reason for their pessimistic outlook was money. For Korean women and men, the burden to buy or lease a house to live after marriage was the most serious obstacle while it was joblessness or lack of secure jobs for Japanese counterparts.
Preparing to come up with funds for marriage is a serious business for the youngsters’ parents. According to the Samsung Life Insurance Retirement Pension Research Center, the two biggest spending items for those retirees were their children’s studying abroad and wedding.
In a survey by the center, the things retirees regret most were not enough nest-egg fund for retirement, as well as insufficient exercise to keep themselves fit and healthy and no lifetime hobbies.
According to the center based on a questionnaire on 93 retirees and 1,633 economically active people, the share of money spent on their children took up 27.6 percent in total unexpected spending after retirement. Other items such as medical spending (12.1%) and expenses for congratulations and condolences (11.8%) followed thereafter.
By Lina Jang (linajang@koreabizwire.com)
