Excessive education-related spending is fueling the growth of so-called “education poor” and raising concerns many middle class families could become impoverished down the road, a local think tank said Sunday.

Hyundai Research Institute, a Seoul-based private think tank, said of the 6.32 million households that reported spending money on private education last year, 13 percent borrowed to pay for outlays while struggling to cope with mounting debt.

“As of 2011, 824,000 households were classified as ‘edu poor’ because they borrowed money to pay for education and chronically spent more than they could earn,” said HRI senior researcher Cho Ho-jeong. These families made up of a main bread earner in his or her 40s, in addition had lower than average incomes.

She said edu poor households earned an average of 3.13 million won ($2,760) per month. The income level is 1.2 million won smaller than the 4.33 million won earned by other households that spent money on private education.

“These households spent a little over 3.81 million won a month overall, much more than the amount of money that came in, with excessive education outlays contributing to the deficit,” the HRI researcher said.

The researcher added that while local households spent 512,000 won on education per month, the edu poor allocated 868,000 won, which is roughly 28.5 percent of their earnings.

The number is much higher than the average 18.1 percent of income earmarked for education outlays by other families in the country.

Cho said that such heavy spending by edu poor households began from kindergarten and continued all the way through high school.

“Considering the fact that 73.3 percent, or 605,000, of the edu poor households are middle class, such spending levels could cause these families to become lower income families down the road,” she said.

Such warnings reflect growing concerns that over-spending on education could bring about a crumbling of the country’s middle class and exert a negative influence on the overall economy. (Yonhap News)