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| Foreign students take part in a Korean-language essay contest at Yonsei University in Seoul, in this Oct. 8, 2019 photo. Korea Times photo by Koh Young-kwon |
By Bahk Eun-ji
Korea ranked 47th out of 59 countries in an index based on a survey to determine the favorability of the living environment and conditions for expats. In the Expats Insider 2021 index released by InterNations, the world's largest expat community with around 4 million members, those in Korea had difficulty settling in, finding friends and feeling at home.
The community conducted the annual survey in January on 12,420 expat respondents, representing 174 nationalities and living in 186 countries or territories, regarding their satisfaction in areas including quality of life, ease of settling in, working life, personal finance and cost of living.
Korea ranked 13th in general living conditions among 61 countries in 2014, but its ranking fell to 55th in 2019. It bounced back slightly to 54th in 2020 and 47th this year.
Taiwan topped the list, followed by Mexico and Costa Rica, while the bottom three countries were Kuwait, Italy and South Africa.
The biggest drawback to living in Korea was difficulty in settling in, with the country ranking 54th in the "Ease of Settling in" category. Korea recieved almost rock-bottom scores for subcategories in the index, ranking 56th out of 57 countries in the "Feeling at home" evaluation, 50th in "Friendliness," and 49th in "Finding friends."
Fifty-four percent of those who responded about Korea said it was difficult to make friends with locals, far higher than the average of 36 percent. InterNations assumed that this was due to the language barrier, because 70 percent of the surveyed expats in Korea said they did not speak Korean, far higher than the global average of expats who did not speak the local language at 43 percent.
However, Korea found a middle ranking on the list for the "Quality of Life" category, ranking 28th. In its subcategories, it performed exceptionally well in "Health and Well-Being," taking second place, with 84 percent of expats saying Korea's medical fees were affordable and 92 percent highly evaluating the quality of medical services, higher than the global average of 61 percent and 71 percent, respectively.
The country also performed better than average in the "Travel and Transportation" subcategory, with 92 percent of respondents rating the transportation infrastructure positively, higher than the global average of 76 percent.
In addition, the respondents were also asked about their life amid the COVID-19 pandemic.
When asked about the impact of the pandemic on their life, 28 percent of respondents in Korea said they decided not move back to their home country in the near future, higher than the global average of 18 percent.
Around 84 percent said they were satisfied with the Korean government's dissemination of pandemic-related information, higher than the global average of 66 percent.
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