Analysis of Participation by Female Seniors in the Korean Job Creation Program for the Elderly

The high aging rate in Korea is unprecedented in the history of the nation. However, the public system for supporting old people financially is insufficient. As a way of coping with rapid aging, the government of Korea launched a job creation program for the elderly in 2004. Five years after its inception, it has now taken the position as a full-scale public labor project. The previous researches on the program were mainly concerned with two issues from gender-neutral perspective, building a system of the program and evaluating its performance. Their finding are also limited as they used the surveys of small sample size collected at a particular time and location, and their methodology relied mainly on subjective opinions by the program participants. The present research is based on more reliable and comprehensive data for empirical analysis and investigates socio-economic conditions of the participants, their participation motives, work types, and also their participation frequency from gender perspective. Female participants were less educated, economically weak, and lived alone. Because of their disadvantaged socio-economic status, they were more likely to choose public service over education in work type. Also, they tended to participate repeatedly in the program to earn income rather than for self-development or social participation. Considering the behavior of female participants, we would suggest that the program be redesigned to fortify income function so that females who have participated for longer period can be benefited with higher wages and extended work days.