60.5% of South Korean college students and recent graduates are “passive job seekers.” (Image courtesy of Yonhap)
SEOUL, Oct. 30 (Korea Bizwire) – A new survey has revealed that 60.5% of South Korean college students and recent graduates are “passive job seekers,” highlighting growing concerns about the country’s employment market for young people.
The Federation of Korean Industries (FKI) surveyed 2,938 students and graduates from four-year universities nationwide for their “2024 University Student Employment Perception Survey.”
Among the 1,235 respondents who were either seniors or recent graduates actively seeking employment, 748 (60.5%) were classified as passive job seekers.
The survey found that 30.9% of passive job seekers were merely “going through the motions” in their job search, while 23.8% reported “almost no job-seeking activities,” and 5.8% were “taking a break” from their search entirely.
When asked why they weren’t actively pursuing employment, 46.7% cited a need to improve their skills, technical knowledge, and capabilities. Other reasons included a lack of jobs in their major or field of interest (18.1%), pessimism about finding employment despite their efforts (14%), and insufficient positions offering adequate wages and working conditions (10.1%).
The job market appears increasingly challenging for active job seekers as well. Those actively searching for employment submitted an average of 6.3 applications this year, with only 1.4 passing the initial document screening stage – a success rate of 22.2%. This marks a significant decline from last year’s document screening success rate of 28.3%.
Of all respondents, 36.5% perceived this year’s job market as more difficult than last year, an increase of 6.2 percentage points from the previous survey. Only 3.2% believed the job market had improved, down from 3.6% last year.
The biggest challenges cited by job seekers included decreased opportunities for entry-level positions due to employers’ preference for experienced workers (27.5%), a shortage of quality jobs with desired working conditions (23.3%), and difficulty gaining practical work experience (15.9%).
The majority of respondents (67.6%) expected their job search to take more than six months, with 30.5% anticipating 6-12 months, 28.2% expecting 1-2 years, and 8.9% preparing for a search lasting more than two years.
According to the Statistics Korea’s supplementary youth survey, the proportion of young people unemployed for more than a year reached 54.4% as of May, up 3.2 percentage points from 2020.
When asked about potential solutions, respondents prioritized improving corporate hiring conditions through deregulation (26.4%), addressing job market mismatches through enhanced career guidance and expanded internship support (21.9%), and reducing the dual structure of the labor market that favors regular workers and unions (18.2%).
“As the economic downturn continues, many young people are losing their motivation to seek employment or are unable to find desired positions,” said Lee Sang-ho, head of FKI’s Economic and Industrial Research department.
“To increase quality job opportunities for youth, we need to focus on boosting corporate vitality and expanding employment capacity through regulatory reform and improvements to the dual labor market structure.”
M. H. Lee (mhlee@koreabizwire.com)
