Mandatory child care leave plan criticized for being unrealistic

Newborn babies sleep in numbered cribs at a postnatal care center in Anyang, Gyeonggi Province, July 27. Newsis

The government’s push to introduce mandatory child care leave, which will begin right after the end of maternity leave and no longer require approval by employers, is stirring up controversy for being impractical and unrealistic.

An official at the Presidential Committee on Ageing Society and Population Policy said on Wednesday that the new policy is currently under consideration as part of efforts to address the Korea’s record-low birthrate, which stood at 0.7 in the second quarter of this year.

But critics say the envisioned policy seems unrealistic, as each company and employee are in different situations, and employees who take child care leave face their income being sharply reduced. This means that not all employees would want to take child care leave right after the end of their maternity leaves.

Some say that the policy could also make employers hesitant to hire workers in their childbearing years, which will not help boost the low birthrate at all.

In Korea, employees are legally entitled up to 90 days of maternity leave and 10 days of paternity leave following the birth of a child.

The law also guarantees up to a one-year leave for child care for both female and male employees, which will increase to one year and six months next year. The employees can choose when to take child care leave until before their child turns eight.

Under the new policy envisioned by the presidential committee, child care leave will become mandatory following the end of maternity leave and no longer require the approval of employers.

The policy is aimed at creating a social atmosphere in which employees can take child care leave more actively.

The committee came up with the policy apparently because some employers still pressure workers applying for child care leave to quit or threaten to exclude them from promotions.

According to the Ministry of Employment and Labor’s 2021 survey, 34.2 percent of employees said they had experienced difficulties in applying for child care leave due to pressure from their employers.

A report by the National Assembly Research Service also stated that the ratio of female and male workers who took child care leave stood at 21.4 and 1.3, respectively, per 100 children.

The figure was the lowest among the OECD member nations that disclosed relevant information.

A meeting of the Presidential Committee on Ageing Society and Population Policy in session at the Government Complex in Seoul, Wednesday. Yonhap

Nevertheless, the push for the new child care leave policy is raising concerns, because it could lead to unexpected consequences where people could become more reluctant to have babies due to their shrinking income during the child care leave period.

Workers receive 80 percent of their ordinary wage when they are on child care leave capped at 1.5 million won ($1,100).

According to the OECD’s Family Database, the child care leave allowance accounted for only 44.6 percent of a worker’s income as of last year. That means the allowance is less than half of the original income.

In addition, if the policy leads to a rapid increase in the number of workers who take child care leave, it will impose a heavy burden on the state employment insurance fund, which is the source of the child care leave allowance.

The fund, operated by the Ministry of Employment of Labor, already has a deficit of 3.9 trillion won, according to the ministry.

Besides the money issue, some argued that it is inappropriate to force workers to take child care leave immediately after maternity leave ends.

“I want to take my child care leave when my son enters an elementary school, as I believe a child needs a mother the most in that period,” a 37-year-old mother and office worker in Seoul said. “Each parent is in a different situation and will think differently. The idea of forcing the child care leave to be taken right after the end of maternity leave is rather at odds with reality.”

Experts said the intent of the new policy is understandable, but the idea contains many problems.

“The government rather needs to draw up a policy that enables parents to opt to take child care leave without any difficulties and companies to accept it,” said Shin Yoon-jeong, a researcher at the Korea Institute for Health and Social Affairs.

“The concepts of the maternity leave and child care leave are different as the former is from a medical perspective, while the latter is related to the rearing of a child. The government should consider the country’s situation that parents should pay more attention to taking care of their child as the child is growing up.”