Unemployed in Seoul soars 20% in 5 years

The problem of unemployment in Seoul has become severe in the wake of the global financial crisis, with the number of jobless people having surged 20 percent since 2007, a city-run think tank said Monday.

The city's number of unemployed people in the second quarter of this year stood at 243,000, up from 207,000 in the same period in 2007 and higher than the five-year average of 228,000, the economic research center at the Seoul Institute said.

Female workers were hit hardest by the city's lack of jobs, with the number of unemployed women rising steadily while that of jobless males declined over the past five years.

Of the city's total number of unemployed, 39 percent were women, up 3 percentage points from 2007, according to the center. The ratio for males, meanwhile, fell 3 percentage points to 61 percent during the same period.

Employment conditions for young people in Seoul remained tougher than for other age groups, with the jobless rate also higher than in 2007.

The unemployment rate for those aged between 15 and 29 stood at 8.2 percent this year, up from the 7.5 percent tallied in 2007, the center said. Although the rate has been showing a downtrend since it reached a high of 8.4 percent in 2010, the current figure is still above the five-year average of 8.1 percent, according to the center.

Compared to other parts of the country, the capital city struggles the most with a lack of jobs for the young, the center said, as the national jobless rate among the young averaged 7.7 percent between 2007 and 2012, 0.4 percentage point lower than in Seoul.

Noting the steady increase of unemployed women and young people, center officials stressed the need for government measures to help women who have difficulty finding work due to marriage and other family-related reasons, as well as to come up with ways to provide job opportunities for the young.(Yonhap)