Long Working Hours and Childcare

Today there are many working parents in the labour market, especially, the increase in the labour participation of mothers is one of the most prominent changes of the recent labour market in Korea. While, at the same time, the family's living circumstances and the requirements imposed by work make working parents' child-rearing more and more difficult. The conflict between work and family life may lead either to a clear dominance of work over the family life or to a reshaping of the present everyay lives of families through changes in existing family policies.
The situation apperars to be more difficult in Korea, where, despite childcare services have expended rapidly, the working parents still have difficulties to find appropiate childcare methods because of their long workng hours. As s result the balancing work and family life through the reduction of working time is the very requisitie of working parents in Korea.
Based on these backgrouds, the aim of my paper is to look at what is happening to the family life under the Long Working Hours Culture in Korea with the issue of childcare. For example, the time pressure of working parents, and their perception of the imbalance of work and family life, and their childcare problems.