Abstract
The purpose of this study is to estimate the rate of credit card payment for private education. The results of study can be used to improve credit card handling problems of private educational institutes, leading toward improvements in income transparency, increase in tax burden equity and long-term economic welfare improvement for individual households. 424 households out of 586 household that were surveyed in September of 2002 had 1,700 cases private extracurricular education. 67 of the 1,700 cases that did not have expenditure records were removed from the analysis. Only 3.67％ out of 1,633 cases were paid by a credit cards and the amount of credit card payment were only 5.65％ of the total amount spent for private education. The average fee of private educational institutes that allow credit card payment was higher than the fees of private institutes which don't allow a credit card payment or those of private institutes where consumers don't know whether a credit card payment was allowed. The average fee of private education paid by credit cards was 34,465.46 won higher than that paid by cash. Credit card payments to private educational institutions is an important social issue with respect to fair tax collection and tax burden equity since most private educational services operate in fairly small sizes and are offered by the self-employed, and the expense of private education is a fairly large proportion of the household income. It is also important for consumers if credit card acceptance expands alternatives that consumers can choose in private education. Therefore, credit card payment should be encouraged in private extracurricular education. To do this, private education providers should be forced to join a credit card payment service by the National Tax Service. A regulation that prohibits the refusal of credit card payments should be required, and credit card service charges of private education providers should be incrementally decreased. Also, consumer education and public promotions for credit card use instead of cash in paying for private education fees are recommended.
