Jobseekers look at employment listings at a career expo for medium-sized companies at Coex in southern Seoul, Tuesday. Yonhap
By Yi Whan-woo
Job losses are outpacing the creation of new positions in Korea, resulting in a slowdown in overall employment growth, data showed, Wednesday.
The situation is exacerbating concerns over the challenges of finding employment, particularly considering factors such as age, gender, and other relevant categories.
According to its quarterly data on jobs for paid workers, Statistics Korea reported that a total of 2.25 million jobs vanished during the October-December period of 2023.
More and more jobs have been disappearing in Korea — from 2.14 million in the first quarter of last year to 2.2 million in the second quarter and 2.21 million in the third quarter.
On the other hand, fewer jobs were created in 2023, falling from 2.6 million in the first quarter to 2.58 million in the second quarter, 2.56 million in the third quarter and 2.55 million in the last three months.
Consequently, the pace of overall job growth slowed over the year — from 457,000 in the first quarter to 379,000 in the second quarter, 346,000 in the third quarter and 293,000 in the fourth quarter.
“We found that jobs are disappearing because companies are shutting down or scaling down their businesses,” Statistics Korea said in its release.
The data partly explains the reason why people in their 20s or younger are facing so much difficulty in securing positions, while many often give up their employment search due to extreme competition in the job market.
The overall number of jobs for those aged 15 to 29 diminished by 97,000 in the last three months of 2023, marking the fifth quarterly decrease.
That was one of two age groups that experienced a decrease in employment during the cited period, with the other group being individuals in their 40s, as job opportunities for them declined by 24,000.
In contrast, 249,000 jobs were added for individuals in their 60s and older, while those in their 50s and 30s also experienced increases in employment by 113,000 and 52,000, respectively.
By gender, the number of job increases in the fourth quarter for women amounted to 204,000, significantly surpassing the 89,000 for men.
Men still constituted a larger portion of the entire workforce nationwide, accounting for 56.5 percent compared to 43.5 percent for women.
The job increase for men was especially high in the manufacturing and warehouse sectors, with each adding 35,000 and 22,000.
For women, 91,000 jobs were added in the health and welfare sectors and 27,000 at hospitality and restaurant businesses.
The construction and education sectors each saw decreases of 14,000 jobs.