Top income families spend 7.8 times in education than lowest earners

High income families are spending eight times in education of children than low income people. With education considered a social ladder to personal and professional success, the huge spending gap could mean that the "rise from humble family" is becoming all the more difficult.

According to Statistics Korea's 2015 third quarter household trends report released Tuesday, monthly average education spending at the highest income quintile, or those earning 6.08 million won (5.077 U.S. dollars) or more a month, stood at 627,700 (524.2 dollars). This was 7.8 times 80,200 won (668.2 dollars) spent by the lowest income quintile earning 2.32 million won (1.937.3 dollars) or less a month.

The share of education costs also showed a wide gap. Education accounted for 15.4 percent of the highest income quintile household's monthly average consumption expenditure of 4.06 million won (3,393 dollars). By contrast, the lowest income quintile household spent just 6.2 percent of its monthly average consumption expenditure of 1.29 million won (1,076.2 dollars).

Education (7.8 times) showed the widest gap between highest and lowest income earners among 12 subcategories of consumption expenditure including transportation, telecommunications, etc. Education spending disparity is also increasingly widening. In annual terms, the highest income quintile spent 6.3 times in education than lowest income quintile in 2010 and 6.1 times in 2011, but the gap has widened since 2012 at 6.5 times to 6.6 times in 2013 and to 7.9 times in 2014.

Experts say the social mobilidy ladder could be broken if private education spending rises and opportunities and quality of education differs according to the wealth of parents. According to Seoul National University's survey of 30,872 junior high school students in 179 schools nationwide, the share of students who belong to the bottom 25 percent of family in socioeconomic rankings and are in the top 25 percent in school performance was 21.8 percent in 2007 but fell to 18.8 percent in 2013.

세종=박민우기자 minwoo@donga.com