Most Couples Still Depend on Parents for Marriage

Only 201,200 couples tied the knot from January to August this year, the fewest since 2005, Statistics Korea said Monday. The economic slump, tough job market and other factors apparently put people put off getting married.

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The Chosun Ilbo and the Ministry of Gender Equality and Family surveyed 1,200 couples and their parents and found that there is still a tendency to have lavish weddings they cannot afford and pay the price later.

Many feel that parents should shoulder some of the marriage cost for their children. Some 84.6 percent of the parents surveyed said they feel obliged to pay for the cost if they can, compared to 64.8 percent of the couples.

Only 10.4 percent of the couples said they paid for the entire cost of getting married. One out of every three couples said their parents paid more than 60 percent.

Although many are acutely aware of the problems plaguing Korea's wedding practices, most of them tend to perpetuate them. Some 57.2 percent said the ideal cost of getting married should be W30 million (US$1=W1,053) excluding the price of a new home, but only 20.9 percent restricted themselves to that limit.

A majority said the parents of the bride and groom should equally split the cost, but 62.8 percent said the groom's family should put up money for the newlywed's house.

A common thread in the answers was the need to keep up with the Joneses. This has spawned three stereotypes that turn getting married into a nightmare. The first is that the groom's parents should provide a home for the newlywed couple, cited by 62.8 percent. Second is the need to exchange an impressive dowry, cited by 44.6 percent. And third is the need to invite vast numbers of guests to impress others, cited by 50.9 percent.

That puts enormous pressure on both sides, creating a vicious cycle whereby they try to invite as many people as possible to recover the cost in cash gifts from guests but that also have to spend vast sums to cater for them.

Shin Sang-chul, a civic activist, said, "It's an embarrassing aspect of our society that customs force us to spend exorbitantly just to save face".