South Korea, a nation of rigid gender norms, meets its changemakers

More South Korean women are working than ever, but entrenched gender expectations haven’t gone away. Women still bear the brunt of household chores and child care, even in families where both parents work, government statistics show. No matter their career aspirations, they’re expected to be jib-saram.

Life as a working mother is often untenable, with a chronic lack of support at work and the largest gender pay gap in the developed world. Women here earn about 69 cents for every dollar their male peers make.

At 43, Koo Eun-kyong says that by Korean standards, she’s expected to be married and a mother by now.

She always wanted both, but her professional success was her priority: She studied in New York, then launched her career in Seoul developing cosmetics as a beauty director working in the upscale Gangnam district, and as a YouTube creator.

Many South Korean women like Koo are delaying motherhood by choice or by circumstance, putting professional and financial goals first.

Now, Koo is among the increasing number of unmarried Korean women freezing their eggs to preserve their chance at becoming a mother when they’re ready.

“Even if I don’t use them, I know I did everything I could and don’t have any regrets,” Koo said.

In a hypercompetitive society where many women struggle to resume their careers after taking a time off to have children, Koo worried a maternity break could set her back. Rising costs of education and housing have also led many middle-class Koreans to focus on making money and delay parenthood.

“You need money to succeed, and only when you are married and have children are you considered someone who lived life well,” Koo said. “Because of the heightened sense of comparison fueled by social media, we can’t help but wonder, ‘Will I really be able to raise my children as well as everyone else? Maybe not; maybe we just shouldn’t have children.’”

For many of these women, egg freezing is becoming an attractive option.

More than 1,100 unmarried women froze their eggs in 2022 at the Cha Medical Group, South Korea’s largest fertility clinic chain, almost double the number in 2019. In September 2023, Seoul started subsidizing the procedure, similar to Tokyo and some jurisdictions in Taiwan.

The process requires medications that stimulate ovaries to overproduce eggs, which are retrieved and frozen until they are ready to be used through artificial insemination. There is no guarantee of pregnancy, but studies show that the age of the woman when she freezes her eggs and the number of eggs stored make a big difference to her chances of conceiving.

Koo shared her experience of having this procedure in detail with more than 43,000 subscribers to her YouTube channel, “JulieKoo.”

Koo said she wanted to help other single women navigate the process after finding they were often sidelined because of legal restrictions: South Korean law requires spousal consent for women to undergo artificial insemination, which means women need to be married to be able to use their frozen eggs.

“There were not many resources for unmarried women who want to freeze their eggs … especially for single women like us who are working in a busy, modern society,” Koo said.

Son Hyun’s approach to fatherhood set him apart not just at his company, but in his country: He was the first at his tech company to take paternal leave, and among a tiny sliver of eligible South Korean men — 5 percent — who do so.

Son, 39, and four other dads founded the Sunday Fathers Club, a weekly newsletter with about 1,800 subscribers that promotes more equitable households. They take turns writing essays published every Sunday, documenting the ups and downs of fatherhood and parental leave.

South Korea allows parents to take up to one year of leave per child, and plans to expand it to 18 months — making it one of the most generous parental leave policies in the world. Yet most fathers eligible for the benefit do not use it because of the stigma around men taking time off for child care.

When a parent does take leave, it is almost always the woman who does so, leading to a dramatic drop-off of women in the South Korean workforce.

Some South Korean couples are challenging structured gender roles that place the burden of child care and housework disproportionately on women, which in turn fuels persistent gender disparity in the country.

“Families can come in many different forms,” said Bae Jeong-min, 41, one of the Sunday Fathers Club authors, who took about a year of parental leave from his IT company in 2020.

The underlying message of the Sunday Fathers Club community may seem simple — that child care is the responsibility of both parents — but it’s not a mainstream one.

“In the past, there was a societal emphasis on masculinity, like being macho,” Son said. “For example: ‘Why should men do this [child care]? It’s not masculine.’ But times have changed, and it’s changing in Korea, too,” he said, recalling advice he received from other fathers about taking on more active roles at home.

For Son, it was a no-brainer to use his parental leave. His wife had used hers after the birth of their daughter, Seowoo, in April 2021. It was his turn after she returned to work, he said.

On a recent weekend, Son was solo parenting while his wife was away on a trip — and it didn’t feel like a big deal after a year as the primary parent.

“There is still a long way to go, but our society is now moving in a positive direction,” he said. “One of the reasons behind the change is the recognition that, of course, women’s careers are important … so of course we need to take turns and pass the baton.”

Shim Jae-shik and Lee Hye-ok have always defied what was expected of them as women. They worked when it was rare for women to do so. They drove cars when few women could get licenses. And they never got married.

At 70, they are living a life unfathomable for most Korean women their age, who would be caring for an aging husband or grandchildren: They’re doing whatever they please.

The rise of singledom in South Korea — or “bihon,” meaning “willingly unmarried” — is a modern concept popularized by a younger generation of women eschewing a marriage-centric society. But women like Shim and Lee paved the way for such a movement decades ago.

“In our days, an unmarried woman was seen as a weird thing … someone to pity,” Lee said. “The choices we made were all by necessity, but now it turns out we were ahead of the curve.”

South Korean women bear the majority of housework up until they are 84 years old, according to a 2023 government study. On the other hand, men start offloading their minimal domestic duties to their wives or other family members by the time they are 47. That means the responsibility of housework, child care and caretaking falls heavily on Korean women through their elderly years.

But not for Shim, Lee and their friend Lee Kyung-ok, also 70. They are among a growing number of South Koreans forming a new kind of familial structure: They are creating communities to help each other navigate housing, retirement and health-care systems built around married couples.

It’s called “DIY family” — a platonic, collective-living model that many people who are “bihon” advocate. As “bihon” individuals in their 30s and 40s grow older, they may find themselves following the footsteps of this trio of 70-year-olds who were living together before it became a trend.

For the past six years, the three women have lived in a home tucked away among fields of yellow melons about 40 miles southeast of Seoul. They host events for their community and take care of five dogs, three cats and six chickens. They start the day together with breakfast at 8 a.m. but maintain separate daily schedules filled with their own hobbies. They say the balance between independence and community is key to a harmonious coexistence.

“We may only have a few more years to live, or we may only live until the day after tomorrow,” Shim said. “But as long as we … don’t get in each other’s way of living a full life, we will continue living together.”

Julie Yoon and Min Joo Kim contributed to this report from Seoul. Photos by Tina Hsu.

Design and photo illustrations by Emily Sabens. Editing by Anna Fifield, Jennifer Samuel, Reem Akkad and Joseph Moore. Copy editing by Vanessa Larson.