Unemployment Problems in Korea

Korean Unemployment L. Jones Unemployment in Korea Unemployment is a difficult subject, both for the individual within a given country or region, as well as for the prosperity of the country or region as a whole. The impact of the Korean unemployment problem has been especially difficult. However, with help from the World Bank, the country has made some significant steps toward improvement.

While it is true that Korean economic growth has been positive, especially in the last four decades (WBG, 2004), there can be little doubt that its relative prosperity has set a dramatic background against which present-day Korean women in specific can count their economic woes.

Although according to a study conducted by Pacific Bridge in 2002 concluded that "the unemployment rate is under 3%, the figure is thought to be the natural rate of unemployment in Korea (Gross, Tran, 2002)," and that "the low unemployment rate suggests that a high level of economic dynamism is currently occurring in the country," there remain significant challenges for unemployed women in the country.

According to a 1998 article in the Korea Herald, the main reason for this problem of growing female unemployment, as well as its official "underreporting," is "the nation's strong patriarchal tradition (Moon, 1998)." This means, according to the article, that Korean companies faced with reducing certain sectors of their workforce, use female employees as a "first strike" measure. Additionally, usually this also means first cutting the lower paying, temp., part-time positions entirely, while maintaining the more "top heavy" higher level (predominantly male) positions.

The reason that this trend is interesting is it illustrates the portion of Korean society that is at most danger whenever unemployment levels within the country rise. Further, because the lower-paying jobs are eliminated, there still remains a significant worker vacuum left after the women's departure. This means an increased demand for foreign workers to take their place. Even those women who are lucky enough to find employment, Moon's article states, are caught in a precarious position.

This is because, as Lee In-sook, a spokesperson for the Women's Employment Equity Association, states, "...women who enter a company on the same level as men do not receive the chances for promotion that men receive and remain in entry level jobs (Moon)." This is simply due to the fact that Korean society generally views men as the "bread earners" of the society.

However, because the women's pay does increase with the length of their employment (although, not on par with their male counterparts), they are often the first to go when the economy takes a downturn. A further problem with unemployment in Korea is in the very reporting of the phenomena. This, according to Korean women's groups, is another casualty of the dominant patriarchal society. According to these groups, the official unemployment figures are necessarily wrong.

They assert that because women are marginalized in the "corporate and business world, for which the Labor Ministry keeps unemployment data (Moon), and are either prevented from looking for a job out of a perceived sense of futility or because of their increased presence in temporary positions or in "the informal economy," that this results in a fundamental error in the numbers. An excellent example of this problem took place in January, 1998, in which Samsung Everland called in "only female employees to ask them to resign (Moon).

When the women took their cases to the Ministry of Labor Affairs, however, they were reinstated. Samsung Everland, however, "denied that any discrimination took place and stated that what happened was due to the national economic situation and a part of companies downsizing (Moon)." Of course, due to the cultural milieu in which patriarchal traditions hold sway, the likelihood that greater numbers of women who do not complain to the Ministry is great.

Again, in an environment such as this, the actual figures on unemployment within Korea are likely to be very much in error, and reflective of only half of the population. Further, "if just left to market forces, female unemployment would rise because the system for evaluating ability and performance are centered around men (Moon)." Of course, an accurate assessment.