According to the 2015 report on Seoul’s social welfare by the Seoul Institute released yesterday, the top 10 percent in the city are making seven times more than those at the bottom 10 percent of the income spectrum.(Image: Kobiz Media)
SEOUL, May 26 (Korea Bizwire) – A new report says the South Korea capital of Seoul has much worse income inequality than any other place in the country, with one in eight adolescents doing literally nothing.
According to the 2015 report on Seoul’s social welfare by the Seoul Institute released yesterday, the top 10 percent in the city are making seven times more than those at the bottom 10 percent of the income spectrum.
The findings were based on the results of a survey conducted by the Seoul Metropolitan Government in 2015 of some 3,000 households in Seoul, which showed the average income gap in Seoul is much larger than that of other cities.
Nearly one in ten households in Seoul earns less than the minimum cost of living, and the Gini coefficient of total income of an average household in the city stood at 0.336, well above that of the average household of urban workers in the country, which was 0.271.
Around 5 percent in Seoul suffer from poverty, a group whose accumulated wealth is less than three months’ worth of the nation’s minimum cost of living.
“The more society develops, they feel ostracized. In Seoul, most household wealth comes in the form of property so in order to tackle income inequality, more efforts need to be undertaken to break down the barriers between different areas,” one of the Seoul Institute researchers said.
The report also revealed poor households take on debt to pay for necessities, including the payment of rental deposits or health care bills, contrary to middle-class households that take out loans to buy a house or cover education expenses for their children.
Low income earners who fall under the category of ‘poor households’ while employed accounted for 6.2 percent of the total, most of whom were undereducated low-skilled male workers in their 50s and 60s.
The report also revealed poor households take on debt to pay for necessities, including the payment of rental deposits or health care bills, contrary to middle-class households that take out loans to buy a house or cover education expenses for their children. (Image: Yonhap)
Over one in ten young people in Seoul were found to be doing neither studying, working or training, many of whom were female with low education levels from low-income households.
Nearly 15 percent of single individuals aged over 25 in Seoul were found to be living with their parents.
The average annual income among households in Seoul was estimated at around 45 million won as of 2014.
Ashley Song (ashley@koreabizwire.com)
