Senior citizens play hwatu, a traditional Korean card game, using digital devices at the Seodaemun Senior Welfare Center in Seoul on July 6.YONHAP
Kim Kyung-rok
The author is an adviser at Optus Asset Management.
Postponing a decision may seem passive, but it can have considerable value. A classic example is the Siege of Osaka, which marked the end of Japan’s Warring States period.
Tokugawa Ieyasu, who unified Japan after 130 years of warfare, confronted Toyotomi Hideyoshi’s son, Toyotomi Hideyori, at Osaka Castle in 1614 and 1615. Hideyori was 22, while Ieyasu was a 72-year-old veteran.
Some in Hideyori’s camp argued for holding out inside the castle. Osaka Castle had ample food, and no one knew what might happen to the elderly Ieyasu. They believed that waiting behind the castle walls could change the course of the war. Hideyori rejected that advice and chose a hard-line military confrontation. He ultimately lost and committed suicide. Ieyasu died the following year. Had Hideyori waited a little longer, Japanese history might have turned out differently.
Similar situations arise in everyday life. People sometimes seek advice after being abruptly reassigned at work, wondering whether they should quit. I have often told them, “Try it for three to six months, and if it still does not feel right, decide then.” Not reaching an immediate conclusion does not mean doing nothing. Time can bring more information and allow for a better choice.
The essence of waiting is preserving the right not to decide now, observing how circumstances develop and making a choice later when conditions are more favorable. Economics explains this through the concept of a “real option.” Waiting has value when the future is uncertain, new information arrives over time, a choice can be made later and a decision made today is difficult to reverse. The longer one can wait before making an irreversible decision, the greater the chance of acting on better information.
The same applies to inheritance. Not transferring assets to children now but postponing the transfer means retaining future options, not simply delaying inheritance. A parent could suddenly develop a serious illness requiring a large sum of money. Family circumstances could also change dramatically because of a child’s marriage or move overseas. With longevity and illness creating uncertainty in retirement, retaining future options is particularly important. The option itself can therefore have economic value even when it is never exercised in practice.
Delaying inheritance has another value: maintaining control and bargaining power with children. If parents transfer all their assets early, they lose an economic means of influencing their children afterward. By retaining some assets, parents can protect their own retirement while encouraging certain behavior from their children. They can also help their children when necessary. Children, in turn, may behave strategically toward their parents with the possibility of future transfers in mind. Inheritance is therefore connected not only to the transfer of wealth but also to strategic behavior between parents and children.
Postponing inheritance thus has two kinds of value. One is its value as a real option: the value of waiting while observing future circumstances and preserving the ability to make a better choice. The other is strategic value. By retaining some assets, parents can preserve bargaining power within the family, particularly in their relationships with their children.
Of course, delaying inheritance comes at a cost. Opportunities to reduce taxes may diminish, and parents may miss the chance to help their children establish themselves earlier in life. If children conclude that assets they may inherit at some distant and uncertain point are of no practical help, the inheritance’s strategic value may decline. Parents must also endure their children’s impatient scrutiny of those assets.
The answer may lie neither in transferring everything at once nor in holding onto everything until the end. Gradual gifting is one option. Parents can first give what is needed, then decide whether to make additional transfers after observing their children’s circumstances and their own retirement needs. This preserves options through multiple decisions rather than fixing the future with a single choice.
Taxes are not the only consideration in inheritance planning. In an age of growing uncertainty, the value of waiting must also be considered. Waiting is not time spent doing nothing. It is time spent buying future control and options.
This article was originally written in Korean and translated by a bilingual reporter with the help of generative AI tools. It was then edited by a native English-speaking editor. All AI-assisted translations are reviewed and refined by our newsroom.
