Older adults fear poverty after retirement due to children’s education, wedding costs

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Kim Jin-ho, 54, an office worker in Seoul, said he calculates numbers in his head before sleeping.

“My son is getting married in October. The wedding will cost 100 million won ($69,000). After that, my savings will drop to below 50 million won. I still have a mortgage to pay and my retirement is less than 10 years away. I wonder if I’ll have to keep working after retirement to support my children, my wife and myself.”

For Lee Sun-young, 55, who runs a clothing shop, the fear comes every time she gets tired sooner than usual.

“I paid well over 150 million won for my daughter’s university tuition and her allowances, then another 70 million won for her wedding,” she said. “I had my savings to cover some, but took out loans for the rest. Now, I don’t think I need another big expenditure, just hoping that I don’t get seriously ill. I thought life in my early 60s would be easier, but I guess I was wrong.”

Like Kim and Lee, many older adults fear poverty after retirement.

Their stories are increasingly common as Korea enters a super-aged society where financial pressure does not necessarily ease with age, but often intensifies.

Despite strong awareness of the need to prepare for retirement, many people in their 50s remain unprepared, largely due to the financial demands stemming from raising children.

According to a report by the Korea Insurance Development Institute (KIDI), more than nine in 10 people in their 40s and 50s said they feel the need to prepare for old age, but only 37.3 percent said they are financially secure.

The report found that about 180 million won was needed on average to cover their children’s education and wedding costs. Some 46 million won was needed for the former and 136 million won for the latter.

This figure exceeds the average retirement benefit of 167.41 million won, meaning many older adults with children effectively enter retirement already in deficit.

Nearly 70 percent of respondents said they rely primarily on state-run National Pension Service payouts, but the income replacement rate stands at just 22 percent.

That means it only replaces about one-fifth of their preretirement income, leaving a big gap for covering living costs.

This shortfall explains why many older adults work after retirement.

The survey found that 58.6 percent of people in their 60s remain economically active, mainly for livelihood reasons. They said medical costs were their primary source of concern.