By Yoon Ja-young
Staff Reporter
Baik Jun-woo, a manager at a mid-sized IT company, logs onto the Internet every few hours, even on weekends. He feels uneasy when he hasn't checked his e-mail in a while.
"I may be a workaholic in some ways, but I do get e-mails from my business partners over the weekend. I have to be working because there are employees working on the weekends. I think most of my colleagues are like me," said the 44-year-old.
If you're someone who continues to think about work even after the workday is done, or gets anxious when not at work, you could define yourself as a workaholic.
But you wouldn't be the only one ― a survey recently showed that one out of three Koreans is a workaholic.
According to a survey by Job Korea, a job market information provider, 30 percent of people surveyed considered themselves a workaholic.
The survey showed that male workers are more likely to be workaholics than their female colleagues, with 33.5 percent defining themselves as such. In the case of females, only 25.1 percent saw themselves as workaholics.
By age group, those in their forties, many of whom work at managerial levels, were the most likely to consider themselves workaholics. Those who did represented 34.1 percent of their age group, while the ratio was below 30 percent for those in their 20s or30s.
Workers at large corporations were more likely to be workaholics, with 37.7 percent defining themselves as such. Those working at state run enterprises, meanwhile, seem to be less stressed out from work. The ratio of workaholics there totaled 23 percent, lower than 29.5 percent at small- and medium-sized businesses.
People in marketing were the most likely to be working too much, with 41.8 percent reporting to be doing so. Workers in personnel affairs divisions were also likely to be workaholics, as wells as those in sales and PR.
Among those in the services or R&D sectors less than 23 percent defined themselves as workaholics.
"As one gets older and gets promoted, the burden of the job gets bigger, making them continue thinking about work even when they get home," said Kim Hwa-soo, CEO of Job Korea. He added that the economic recession seems to have made more people show the tendencies of a workaholic.
chizpizza@koreatimes.co.kr
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