Hultberg, PatrikCalonge, David SantandreuKim, Seong-Hee2020-02-262020-02-2620172017Hultberg, P., Calonge, D. S., & Kim, S.-H. (2017). Education policy in South Korea: A contemporary model of human capital accumulation? Cogent Economics and Finance, 5(1). https://doi.org/10.1080/23322039.2017.138980423322039http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/23322039.2017.1389804http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.12519/173This article is licensed under Creative Commons License and full text is openly accessible in CUD Digital Repository. The version of the scholarly record of this article is published in Cogent Economics and Finance (2017), accessible online through this link https://doi.org/10.1080/23322039.2017.1389804.We argue that South Korean families with children are today overinvesting in the level of education due to their high levels of expenditures on private after-school tutoring programs. This situation has evolved due to a combination of factors: a changing labor market, increasing housing and debt payments, as well as an educational “arms race” among Korean families with children. These changes are exacerbating both economic and social issues in Korean society, but are increasingly difficult to address due to issues of complementarity and coordination failures related to educational expenditures. Korea might be inexorably falling into a surprising “education trap.”. © 2017 The Author(s).enCreative Commons Attribution (CC-BY) 4.0 license.Education policyEducational expendituresHuman capitalPrivate tutoringSouth KoreaArticleCopyright : 2017 The Author(s)