Pronatalist population policy options in South Korea’s sub-replacement fertility transition

Kwang-Hee Jun, ChungNam National University

In this paper, I will begin with a concise review of the fertility transition between 1970 and 2008, separating it into three periods. In this part, I will use the Bongaarts-Feeney model which explains how age at childbearing, unwanted fertility, gender preference, child replacement, and other competing preferences suppress or promote the desired family size (DSF) to influence the observed TFRs. In the second part, I will attempt to sort out pronatalist policy options needed to cope with the adverse effects of lowest-low fertility in South Korea, summarizing some feasible pronatalist policies and programs for the incumbent Korean government and its ideological spectrum. This paper will conclude that the transition of power between a liberal government and a conservative government must not signify the separation between past and current tools in policy implementation in South Korea.