The signboards of small shops in Myeongdong, downtown Seoul (Yonhap)
SEOUL, March 10 (Korea Bizwire) — While one in five office workers say they have had “experience in starting a business” in the past, many of them had to shut down fewer than two years later, a recent report showed.
According to a survey conducted by job search portal JobKorea of 1,348 adult men and women, 19.2 percent of the respondents said they had operated their own business in the past.
By age, 25.8 percent were in their 30s, followed by 24.3 percent for those in their 40s and 12.5 percent for those in their 20s.
By gender, men accounted for 20.8 percent, slightly higher than women, who accounted for 17.8 percent.
The main reason for starting their own business was “money,” accounting for 51 percent, followed by 37.5 percent who said they were following their dream.
However, most of these businesses did not last long. Only 8.1 percent of the respondents said they were still in business.
Roughly two thirds of the respondents had to shut down operations less than two years after launching their business. Even worse, 36.7 percent of respondents said their start-up did not last a year.
Looking at the retention period of start-ups by response group, the lower the age, the shorter the retention period was.
More than half, or 52.5 percent of those in their 20s quit their business within a year, compared to 38.3 percent and 11.9 percent of those in their 30s and 40s or older, respectively.
In particular, 75 percent of college students quit their businesses within a year, while 93.8 percent of college students quit within two years.
Meanwhile, when asked if they were currently considering starting a business, 43.3 percent said yes.
Of the total respondents, the willingness to start a business was the highest at 50.6 percent among those in their 40s and older. Workers also showed high motivation, accounting for 46.5 percent when analyzing the results by profession.
When it came to major hurdles preventing people from starting a business, the most common was “fear of financial burden when the business closes,” accounting for 51.6 percent.
Ranking second was the “difficulty in raising start-up funds,” accounting for 33.8 percent, while third place was “the cost of living up to the break-even point and pressure on profits,” which accounted for 22.6 percent.
D. M. Park (dmpark@koreabizwire.com)
