By Lee Hyo-sik
Staff Reporter
The number of workers in their 20s and 30s has declined this year at its fastest pace since the currency crisis a decade ago, as businesses downsize their existing workforce and remain reluctant to hire new employees to cope with the current economic slump.
Many expect the job market here to continue to worsen for young salaried employees and the self-employed toward the year's end, with corporate restructuring going into full swing and more non-permanent workers losing jobs in relation to the law governing the status of non-regular workers.
According to the Bank of Korea (BOK) and the National Statistical Office (NSO) Sunday, the number of people in their 20s and 30s who are employed stood at a monthly average of 9.62 million during the January to May period this year, down 322,000 from the same period last year.
The pace of the decrease was the steepest since the first five months of 1999 when about 420,000 young workers were dismissed in the aftermath of the 1997-98 Asian financial crisis.
In May, a total of 219,000 jobs disappeared from a year earlier, the highest year-on-year job loss since March 1999 when the country lost 390,000 positions as a result of massive corporate layoffs following the financial market turmoil.
``Many university graduates have been unable to find the type of job they want as companies do not offer as many regular positions with handsome paychecks and benefits as they did before the economic slowdown. Also, young workers employed on a temporary basis are increasingly losing jobs, with struggling businesses targeting them first for layoffs,'' a BOK official said.
He warned the dwindling young workforce will weaken the nation's economic vitality and growth potential, suggesting the government not only introduce support measures for older workers, but also become more aggressive in helping young people find jobs.
However, Korea's labor market will likely turn from bad to worse in the second half of the year, with more than 250,000 jobs projected to disappear as a result of a full-scale corporate restructuring.
A rise in the number of jobless salaried workers will force households to tighten their purse strings further, which will hit the already struggling self-employed and small businesses hard.
``When more companies undergo restructuring in the latter half, we may lose nearly 300,000 jobs. Additionally, the situation could become much worse unless the National Assembly does something about the law concerning the status of temporary workers,'' the BOK official said.
Under the law revised in August 2007, employers are required to turn non-permanent workers into regulars after two years of employment. This prompts employers to lay off temporary employees before the two-year limit as companies find it costly to upgrade their status. There are an estimated 970,000 workers whose two-year hiring period ends in July, which will likely slash the non-regular workforce.