Is the Glass Ceiling a Motherhood Ceiling After All?

Sammanfattning: South Korea has the highest gender pay gap and the lowest fertility rate in the OECD (OECD Data, n.y.). Gender equity theory suggests that there is a link between high gender inequality and low fertility, as women struggle to have both a career and a family. A growing share of Korean women are voluntarily childless, referred to as the Sampo Generation, giving up dating, marriage, and children, to focus on their careers (Maybin, 2018; UN, 2013). This study quantifies to what extent women are penalized in the labor market for having children, referred to as child penalties. Testing the impact of having children on the labor market outcomes of earnings, wage rate, hours worked, and labor force participation after first births, this study confirms previous studies in the U.S. and in Europe, that also Korean women are penalized in the labor market for having children, while there is generally no child penalties for men. Initially, children reduce female earnings by 34% to never recover to pre-birth levels, and the in the long run, childbirth increases the gender pay gap by 55%. Moreover, low-and middle-skilled women and women with several children experience larger child penalties. The size of the female child penalties are decreasing over time, suggesting that the recent expansion of paid parental leave and childcare provision has an impact on gender equality and specifically on labor market outcomes of mothers.