Millennial couple who moved to South Korea say $400 a month for full-time child care is a huge benefit

• A millennial couple moved to South Korea with a child less than a year old.

• They found a full-time daycare option for just over $400 a month.

• Raising children in South Korea can be an experience much more expensive As they get older.

About 10 months ago, Chris Oberman and his wife welcomed their first child together. They are learning to be parents in an unfamiliar environment, but there is one thing that might work in their favor: low child care costs.

Since 2019, the couple and their two cats have lived in five cities in four countries. Oberman's wife, who preferred not to be named for privacy reasons, has a government work Which forces them to move every few years.

They began their journey by moving from the Netherlands —Oberman's home country— Beijing, Carry offand ErbilIraq. They lived in each place for about two years each. The couple then moved to SeoulSouth Korea, approximately two months ago, where they currently reside.

From a financial perspective, Oberman's first impression of Seoul was that food and housing were “quite expensive.” He said they expect to pay between $4,500 and $5,000 a month for a three- or four-bedroom house with an outdoor space (in the meantime, they live in a hotel). However, there is one major cost that seems to be quite affordable: child care.

The couple found a full-time daycare option (five days a week from 9 to 5) that charges roughly the equivalent of $406 a month for children under one year old, according to a document provided to Business Insider. That figure drops to $357 a month for one-year-olds and $296 for two-year-olds. In the US, the average annual cost of child care for one child was more than $100 a month. $11,000 in 2023, or about $965 a month, according to the advocacy organization Child Care Aware.

“Full-time daycare is really cheap,” the 38-year-old told BI via email. He said his son will start attending daycare in October on a part-time basis.

High child care costs in the United States are making it difficult More difficult for some families to pay the bills, resulting in some women Dropping out of the workforceand are among the reasons why some couples have decided to postpone or give up having childrenBetween 1983 and 2023, child care costs in the United States will increase increased by more than 800% compared with a 300% increase in headline inflation, according to a BI analysis published last year.

But not all countries provide childcare with such high prices.

A bank of America report A study published in February found that among 30 developed countries analyzed, South Korea ranked fifth among countries with the most affordable child care costs (the United States and the Netherlands ranked 29th and 22nd, respectively). Bank of America used OECD data to estimate the average child care costs for a couple with two children in a given country and compared them to the average combined salaries of a couple with the same profile.

The story continues

Of course, childcare is not the only cost associated with having children. A report released in February by a Beijing think tank concluded that when it comes to the total cost of having children, raising children until they are 18China is the only country that is more expensive than South Korea. The pressure to enroll children in expensive programs like Music classes and private lessons are among the factors that have driven up the costs of raising children in cities like Seoul.

These costs are one of the reasons why many people in South Korea decide not to have children: the country has the lowest birth rate in the world. Over the past two decades, the South Korean government has invested Billions of dollars in an effort to entice people to have children, including a Childcare subsidyHowever, many people in the country, partly because of Financial reasonsThey don't have children yet.

While Oberman's daycare costs are “pretty cheap” in her opinion, she said South Korea's low birth rate has forced some daycares to near due to insufficient demand, resulting in some long waiting lists for the remaining centres.

“We were very lucky not to have to wait too long,” he said.

While Oberman has heard that raising children in South Korea gets more expensive as they get older, she said that by the time that happens, there's a good chance her family will have moved to another country.

“We just have to take care of the daycare,” he said.

Have you recently moved to a new country or state and are willing to share your story? Are you struggling to afford high child care costs? Contact this reporter at jzinkula@businessinsider.com.

Read the original article at Business information