Child Gender and Parental Inputs: No More Son Preference in Korea?

Abstract

Sex ratio at birth remains highly skewed in Asian countries due to son preference. In South Korea, however, it has declined to the natural ratio. In this paper, we investigate whether son preference has disappeared in Korea by analyzing parents' time and monetary inputs by the sex of their child. We exploit randomness of the first child's sex to overcome potential bias from endogenous fertility decisions. Our findings show that mothers are more likely to work after having a girl, girls spend twice as much time as boys in housework activities, and parents spend more on private education for boys.