Moon's approval rating down to new low of 55.2%
President Moon Jae-in's approval rating continued to drop last week amid worsening economic conditions, a poll showed Monday.
Moon's approval rating came to 55.2 percent in a survey conducted by Realmeter, down 0.8 percentage point from the week before.
The weekly survey was conducted Monday through Friday, involving 2,507 adults throughout the nation.
The reading was the third consecutive week the rating had dropped and was a record low since the president took office in May 2017.
Moon faces strong criticism for his iconic income-led growth strategy that seeks to boost the income of wage earners, which he says will lead to a rise in domestic consumption, revitalizing the whole economy.
Apparently swayed by the new government strategy, the tripartite commission on the minimum wage hiked it by 16.4 percent to 7,530 won ($6.75) per hour at the start of this year. The minimum wage is again set to jump 10.9 percent to 8,350 won per hour in 2019.
Such a steep increase, however, is believed to have forced local businesses to cut back on jobs instead.
An earlier report from the statistics office said the country added only 5,000 new jobs from a year earlier in July, compared with more than 100,000 new jobs added the previous month.
In the latest survey, 40.0 percent of those surveyed said they did not approve of the way the president managed state affairs -- the largest proportion since Moon's inauguration.
The ruling Democratic Party too continued to suffer a setback with its own approval rating slipping 0.5 percentage point from a week earlier to 41.4 percent.
The approval rating of the main opposition Liberty Korea Party dropped 1.7 percentage points to 18.8 percent, while that of the progressive Justice Party inched down 0.3 percentage point to 11.8 percent.
The minor opposition Bareunmirae Party and the Party for Democracy and Peace saw their ratings gain 0.6 percentage point and 0.2 percentage point, respectively, to 6.6 percent and 2.8 percent. (Yonhap)