Welcome! I am a Ph.D. Candidate in the Department of Economics at Seoul National University.
My research interests lie primarily in labor economics and behavioral/experimental economics, focusing on Korean contexts.
E-mail: bongseop@snu.ac.kr
CV (April, 2025)
Working Papers
Beliefs about the Career Costs of Children and Family Formation, (with Tammy Sunju Lee)
Under Construction
Abstracts: While existing literature emphasizes that the career costs women face due to childbearing are key drivers of low fertility in high-income countries, there are few empirical studies investigating how individuals form beliefs about these costs and whether such beliefs influence their fertility decisions. Using a sample of South Korean workers aged 19 to 40 years, we conduct an online survey to examine the relationship between the individuals' beliefs about the career costs of children and their family formation plans. We also execute an information provision experiment to assess how objective information about the likelihood of women continuing to work post-childbirth leads to changes in beliefs and family formation plans. We find that female respondents overestimate the career costs of having children in Korea and have pessimistic beliefs about their career prospects post-childbirth. These pessimistic beliefs are strongly associated with negative fertility and marriage plans, particularly among those with positive current career prospects and higher incomes. However, the provision of information leads to only modest changes in family formation plans, as respondents interpret the information negatively. Overall, this study provides valuable insights into the role of beliefs and information in family formation decisions.
Abstracts: This paper examines the effects of increasing pensionable age on an individual's labor supply, focusing on Korean pension reforms. In Korea, the pensionable age for full pension benefits has increased from 60 to 65 over the course of twenty years. Using individual-level administrative data, I implement a regression discontinuity with a second difference (RD-DD) design, and find that the 1-year increase in the pensionable age has a positive but relatively modest effect on labor supply. Raising the pensionable age from 61 to 62 leads to an increase of 0.6 percentage points (1.0% increase) in employment rate and 0.76 million won (5.2% increase) in annual earnings at age 61. This change is driven by existing workers who choose to postpone retirement and remain in the workforce. The increase in employment is mainly observed in self-employment, and there is also an increase in the proportion of individuals taking on side jobs. The labor supply response is more pronounced among females and workers who earned higher wages previously.
Predicting the Demand for CBDC: A Discrete Choice Experiment Analysis, (with Syngjoo Choi, Young Sik Kim, Ohik Kwon, and Soeun Park)
Abstracts: This paper conducts a discrete choice experiment with a nationally representative sample of over 3,500 participants to predict the preference for Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDC) as a means of payment. We randomly vary nine monetary and non-monetary attributes that cover the wide range of those values to include not only existing payment methods but also potential payment methods such as CBDC. We find that the preference for a payment method is highly responsive to both monetary attributes, such as discount rate, and non-monetary attributes, such as issuance form; for instance, an increase in the discount rate can increase the adoption of a payment method by up to 11 percentage point and the change of issuance form from banknotes to smartphone apps has a similar effect size. Simulations based on the estimates from this experiment allow us to predict that about 15%~23% of the respondents choose CBDC as the most preferred payment method, second most popular after credit or debit cards. These results indicate that once introduced, CBDC would be more readily used than cash or mobile fast payment. Further, the preference for CBDC is highly responsive to its own and alternative's discount rates, implying that financial rewards for CBDC and existing payment methods are likely to play an important role in the adoption of CBDC.
Publications
Why Do You Like or Dislike Your Job?, (with Sangmin Aum and Jungmin Lee), Forthcoming at Labour Economics
Abstracts: This study investigates the relative importance of non-wage job attributes, with a particular focus on corporate culture and overtime work. Using a discrete choice experiment with 3,026 wage workers in South Korea, we estimate the willingness-to-pay for a horizontal corporate culture, no overtime requirement, career development opportunities, and commuting time flexibility. We find that workers place the highest value on a horizontal corporate culture, followed by no overtime requirement. Using auxiliary data on working conditions from a nationally representative survey, we find that accounting for the non-uniform distribution of these non-wage job attributes across workers exacerbates compensation inequality.
Central Bank Digital Currency and Privacy: A Randomized Survey Experiment, (with Syngjoo Choi, Young Sik Kim, and Ohik Kwon), Forthcoming at International Economic Review
Abstracts: Privacy protection is among the key features to consider in the design of central bank digital currency (CBDC). Using a nationally representative sample of over 3,500 participants, we conduct a randomized online survey experiment to examine how the willingness to use CBDC as a means of payment varies with the degree of privacy protection and information provision on the privacy benefits of using CBDC. We find that both factors significantly increase participants’ willingness to use CBDC by up to 64% when purchasing privacy-sensitive products. Our findings provide useful insights regarding the design and the public’s adoption of CBDC.
Other Publications
The path towards herd immunity: Predicting COVID-19 vaccination uptake through results from a stated choice study across six continents, (Stephane Hess, Emily Lancsar, ..., Mark H.P.Zuidgeest), Social Science & Medicine, 298, 2022
* notes: I was responsible for the Korea section along with Prof. Syngjoo Choi.
Abstracts: Despite unprecedented progress in developing COVID-19 vaccines, global vaccination levels needed to reach herd immunity remain a distant target, while new variants keep emerging. Obtaining near universal vaccine uptake relies on understanding and addressing vaccine resistance. Simple questions about vaccine acceptance however ignore that the vaccines being offered vary across countries and even population subgroups, and differ in terms of efficacy and side effects. By using advanced discrete choice models estimated on stated choice data collected in 18 countries/territories across six continents, we show a substantial influence of vaccine characteristics. Uptake increases if more efficacious vaccines (95% vs 60%) are offered (mean across study areas = 3.9%, range of 0.6%–8.1%) or if vaccines offer at least 12 months of protection (mean across study areas = 2.4%, range of 0.2%–5.8%), while an increase in severe side effects (from 0.001% to 0.01%) leads to reduced uptake (mean = −1.3%, range of −0.2% to −3.9%). Additionally, a large share of individuals (mean = 55.2%, range of 28%–75.8%) would delay vaccination by 3 months to obtain a more efficacious (95% vs 60%) vaccine, where this increases further if the low efficacy vaccine has a higher risk (0.01% instead of 0.001%) of severe side effects (mean = 65.9%, range of 41.4%–86.5%). Our work highlights that careful consideration of which vaccines to offer can be beneficial. In support of this, we provide an interactive tool to predict uptake in a country as a function of the vaccines being deployed, and also depending on the levels of infectiousness and severity of circulating variants of COVID-19.
Work in Progress
The Effects of Residential College Program on Student Outcomes, (with Jungmin Lee) [AEA RCT Registry-0011897]
Perceptions of the Social Norms and Attitudes toward Parental Leave Use, (with Tammy Sunju Lee) [AEA RCT Registry-0012988]