Lee Min-hyung joined The Korea Times in 2014 and has worked as a journalist mainly in Korea’s finance, tech and automotive industry. He specializes in content creation, breaking news and in-depth analysis currently on transportation and mobility. You can reach him via mhlee@koreatimes.co.kr.
6 in 10 unretired people earn less than W2 mil.
By Lee Min-hyung
By Lee Min-hyung
Six in 10 unretired people receive a monthly salary of less than 2 million won ($1,718), according to data.
The survey, released by Statistics Korea, showed that about 62.5 percent of wage workers aged between 40 and 64, who got new jobs less than a year after they retired from their previous workplaces, made less than that amount. The figure was based on data as of October last year.
Those who earned between 1 million won and 2 million won accounted for 50.9 percent of the 819,000 surveyed workers. They took up the largest portion of unretired people's income level.
The monthly income level of between 2 million won and 3 million won came in second, with 22.7 percent of the unretired wage laborers belonging to the category, according to data.
Only less than four percent of them made more than 5 million won, indicating income polarization among the unretired still exists.
Data also showed that the older the workers are, the less money they make. By age groups, those in their early 40s made a monthly average salary of 2.3 million won. Those in their early 50s made slightly less, 2.17 million won on average.
By gender, men made an average monthly income of 2.15 million won, while woman earned 1.77 million won, according to the survey.
Aside from the surveyed wage workers, about 425,000 middle-aged people have run private businesses for a year since October 2017.
As of Nov. 1 last year, the nation's middle-aged population reached 19.82 million, accounting for about 40 percent of the total population, according to the state-run statistics organization. Sixty-three percent of them, equal to 12.47 million, were employed.
Of all middle-aged workers, about 963.6 million, or 77.2 percent, were wage earners. Nineteen percent of all the middle-aged laborers were self-employed.