Participants examine job postings on a bulletin at a job fair for North Korean defectors held in Seoul, in this file photo taken Dec. 1, 2023. (Yonhap)
SEOUL, Dec. 24 (Korea Bizwire) – Around one-fifth of North Korean defectors in South Korea live in Seoul, but close to 70 percent of them have a hard time making ends meet, a think tank report showed Sunday.
The Seoul Institute, a research center established by the Seoul city government, analyzed residential data of North Korean defectors provided by the Ministry of Unification and conducted a survey on those aged between 19 and 60 living in Seoul from Dec. 15, 2022, to Jan. 16, 2023.
According to the report, 20.6 percent of 31,362 North Korean defectors were living in the country’s capital and 69.4 percent of them said they had a hard time financially supporting themselves over the past year.
Four out of 10 people, or 37.7 percent, were recipients of the government’s basic living subsidies, while more than half, or 58.7 percent, were living on a monthly living cost of under 1 million won (US$769.80), the report showed.
In terms of their housing situation, only 5.7 percent said they own a home, while close to half, or 46.3 percent, said they were living in government rental homes.
The most cited hardships that defectors residing in Seoul faced were “saving money and building assets,” followed by “social stigma and discrimination,” and “earning opportunities to generate income.”
Despite such difficulties, 90.4 percent said they are “strongly willing” to live in Seoul for the next 10 years, the survey also showed.
(Yonhap)
