[Citizen College] Child Poverty: Comparison between Korea and Japan

On June 8, 2018, the 8th lecture of “Citizen College: Citizens Between Life and Knowledge” was held by Seongbuk Village Citizenship Education Center and the Korea University Peace and Democracy Institute(PDI). The 8th speaker was Professor Insook Choi of PDI.

The topic of the lecture was “Children’s Poverty: Comparison between Korea and Japan”. She examined child poverty, which is now a big problem in Japan, and compared it with the case in Korea. Japan’s child poverty rate has continued to rise, reaching 10% in 1985, and close to 16% in 2012. Reasons for such child poverty is the destruction of family function due to domestic violence and divorce, the change of the role concept of ‘parents’, and the destruction of the school due to extreme private tutoring. Korea has a lower rate of child poverty than Japan, but the relative poverty problem is serious, and the problem of child poverty has not even risen to the surface. In order to solve such child poverty, social safety net should be activated and universal welfare must be realized. At the national level, it will be necessary to establish a control tower dedicating child policy and establish specific child policies. (Summary: Moon-Hyung Lee)