By Lee Kyung-min
Kim, an office worker and father of a nine-year-old, goes home after work at 8 p.m. at the earliest. After taking a shower and eating dinner, it's almost 9 p.m. and his boy is asleep.
"During weekdays, it is almost impossible to play with him," he said.
Some bosses do not like workers who say they need to go home early to take care of their children. "Some ask offensive questions such as ‘Where is your wife, is she cheating on you?' Putting your family's needs before work is regarded as a failure in office life," he said.
Kim's case can be applied to most working parents in Korea. About 80 percent of working parents have difficulty finding time to play and talk with their children after work, mostly because they finish so late, a government study showed Tuesday.
According to research by the Ministry of Gender Equality and Family on 1,000 working parents with children aged under 13, 66 percent said they have no time to do activities with their children other than helping with homework occasionally or putting them to bed. Another 13 percent said they never have time after work to spend with their kids, while 20.3 percent they do so at least three days per week.
With regard to not having time, 65 percent of surveyed fathers said this was the case because they come home late, and 58.5 percent said it was because they were tired from work, when multiple replies were allowed.
In the case of mothers, 60.8 percent said because they have to do household chores in the evening after work, and 49.3 percent said because they were tired from work.
More than 61 percent of the respondents said they are unable to go home on time, primarily because of overworking and also due to office culture where junior employees do not go home before seniors do. Some 21 percent said they come home after 9 p.m.
"About 64 percent of the parents said that to maintain a work-family balance, it was important for the country to have a culture to allow employees to go home on time," a ministry official said.
Internet users said that this study showed the precise reason why the nation is suffering from a low birthrate.
"When seeing the reality, which is so unfavorable to young parents, the government's campaign to encourage people to have children seems hollow," a blogger wrote.
Another said that if the nation does not properly respect employees' roles as parents, it will ultimately hurt the family bond.
"Children, especially younger ones, need their parents. Being unable to be there when they need me makes me feel like I am unfit mother, letting them down," an Internet user wrote.
Meanwhile, in related research on 500 elementary schoolchildren, what they most want to do with their parents in the evening was to play board games and do puzzles. They also said they want to spend time outside with their parents playing soccer, baseball, basketball and badminton.
Source: koreatimes.co.kr,
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