How Gangnam Parents Splurge on Private Education

Residents of Seoul's upscale Gangnam district pay 4.5 times the national average for their children's private education.

According to data from the Gangnam district office, families there pay a monthly average of W1.14 million for the private education of their primary and secondary schoolchildren, compared to the national average of W240,000 (US$1=W1,058).

Families with a monthly income of less than W2 million pay W880,000 a month for private crammers, and those earning more than W10 million pay W1.6 million.

Crammers in Gangnam mushroomed 9.4 percent from 2010 to 2011, from 3.2 per 1,000 people to 3.5. That is more than double Seoul's already high average of 1.3 per 1,000 people.

There were 1,965 private crammers in the district in 2011, up 7.1 percent from 2010. Of the 1,247 households the district office surveyed, 95 or 7.6 percent had children who have studied abroad, with an average per-child cost of a whopping W48.58 million.

The average time their children spend overseas is 21.4 months at college, 19.1 months in high school, 11.6 months in both middle and elementary school. Even Gangnam preschoolers spend an average of 12.9 months abroad.

Some 27.5 percent of households in the district earn more than W5 million a month, 8.8 percentage points more than the city's overall average of 18.7 percent, but down from 35.9 percent two years ago.