By Choi Sung-jin
Recent news reports about parents abusing, and even killing, their children has shocked many Koreans. No less alarming are the social and economic costs, a report says.
According to a study by professors Kim Su-jeong and Chung Ik-jung of Ehwa Womans University, the social and economic costs range from 389.9 billion won to 76 trillion won ($334.3 million to $65 billion).
The maximum cost accounts for 5.1 percent of Korea’s gross domestic product. It is the first estimation of the socio-economic costs of child abuse in Korea.
“In calculating the social and economic costs of child abuse, we have to take into account not only the medical costs but also those of curing mental disorders and crime-related costs,” the professors said in the report, which will be in the journal “Children’s Welfare in Korea” to be released this month.
The two academics calculated the direct and indirect costs separately and added the sums later. They estimated the minimum and maximum direct costs at 88.46 billion won and 8.79 trillion won, respectively, for treating physical and mental damage, bringing abusers to justice and protecting victimized children at specialized institutions.
Indirect costs ranged between 301.4 billion won and 68.2 trillion won, which included losses caused by the victims’ failure to get jobs as well as the costs of treating various after-effects, receiving special education, dealing with divorces, maintaining a basic livelihood, and holding funerals in the case of premature deaths or suicides.
“The government’s budget for institutions specializing in child protection fell to 37.2 billion won this year, down 11.6 billion won from 2015, accounting for 9.5 percent of minimum costs and 0.05 percent of maximum costs, respectively,” the report said. “Among indirect costs, those caused by joblessness make up more than half of the total.”
The report attributed the wide gap between minimum and maximum costs to lack of related data in Korea, stressing the need for accumulating data and studies of victims’ damage throughout their lives, as happens in advanced countries.