Shortening the work week to 35 hours is a “necessary step” if South Korea hopes to reverse its record-low birth rate, researchers have said, with a new study warning that excessive working hours are discouraging young couples from starting families.
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The report, released on Tuesday by the Gyeonggi Research Institute (GRI), has blamed the country’s alarmingly low birth rate on a corporate culture that demands long work hours for career progression.
South Korea has the lowest recorded fertility rate of any country, with government data from 2023 showing the average number of expected babies for a South Korean woman during her reproductive life fell to 0.72 that year from 0.78 in 2022. A fertility rate of 2.1 is needed to maintain a population.
GRI researchers said the current legal limit of 52 hours of work per week – implemented in 2018 and consisting of 40 standard hours plus 12 hours of overtime – did not provide enough work-life balance to encourage family planning.
In a 2024 GRI poll of 1,000 workers aged 20 to 59, excessive hours were cited as the biggest barrier to balancing family responsibilities, with 26.1 per cent of men and 24.6 per cent of women listing it as their main obstacle.
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Dual-income households in their 30s expressed the strongest desire for reduced hours, hoping to cut about 84 to 87 minutes from their working day on average.