By Choi Sung-jin
The number of workers, mostly young ones, who receive “passion pay” has increased sharply in recent years, a report said Monday. “Passion pay” refers to low wages paid by employers who say passion is more important than pay for younger people.
According to Hyundai Research Institute, the number of workers aged 15-29 who received passion pay, which is below the minimum wage, totaled 635,000 as of the end of last year.
The share of young workers who receive passion pay fell from 14.7 percent (539,000) in 2009 to 12.3 percent (449,000) in 2011 but has since surged back to 635,000 last year, an increase of 186,000 in just four years.
“The protracted economic slump and the relatively rapid rise in the legal minimum wage seem to be behind the sharp rise in the portion of young workers receiving passion pay,” said Lee Jun-hyeop, a researcher at the institute.
The wage gap between young workers who receive passion pay and those who get “normal” pay has also widened, with the wage of the former, 4,515 won ($3.9) an hour on average, standing at only 42 percent of the latter, which stood at 10,741 won. The monthly salary of passion-pay workers stood at 710,000 won, only 38.1 percent of the 1.85 million won for non-passion pay workers.
The share of non-passion pay workers who received vocational training over the past year rose from 36.4 percent to 59.5 percent, but that of passion-pay workers rose only from 13 percent to 19 percent. The widening gap in job opportunities would weaken the vocational ladder for passion-pay youths, the report said.
The passion-pay workers were mostly among the youngest group (ages 15-24), college students, those working at service businesses and small firms, non-regular workers and part-timers. They were hit harder during business setbacks than those aged 25-29, college graduates, office workers, employees at large companies and regular workers, it said.