Divergence in Women’s Employment in Korea and Japan: What Shapes the Different Patterns around Childbirth?

With female employment patterns and their ever-diverging degrees in Korea and Japan, this paper identifies which factors influence women’s labor supply around childbirth in each country, and draws cross-country analysis. It also aims to understand the different social context of each labor market, general attitudes towards female employment and work-life balance in two countries. With KLIPS and JPSC - the nationally representative panel data in each country -, we find that both Korean and Japanese women with more human capital and better employment status are likely to retain regular jobs. Japanese women’s employment, whether regular or non-regular, is positively affected by one’s cohort (the cohort effect), while negative by her spouse’s income level. On the contrary, the results of Korean women demonstrate no signs of such similarity as in Japan. Consequently, it indicates that women’s human capitals and job opportunities function as key mechanism determining their employment status in both countries.