The Korea Local Administration Review

The low fertility rate has emerged as a serious problem in Korea since2005. Responding to such a low fertility rate, the Korean government hasimplemented various childbirth encouragement programs at the central and locallevel, nevertheless the fertility rate of Korea is still tied up at the lowest levelin the world. Of lots of childbirth encouragement policy, this article tried toarticulate the impact of Maternity subsidies policy (hereafter MSP) which hasbeen controversial issue from its beginning. To test the impact of MSP, thisarticle analyzed 25 local governments in Seoul with multiple panel regressionanalysis from 2005 to 2009. The analyzing results are that MSP has no effecton total fertility rate, childbirth, and age-specified fertility rate as well. On theother hand, the result of age-specified fertility rate analysis shows that policiessuch as; cutting down on child-rearing and private education expenses,enlarging the number of day care center and measures for the work and familycompatibility, enhancing marriage rate, could be more effective way to raisefertility rate at the age of mid twenties and the thirties who have emerged asmain fertility groups recently.