Foreign wives showing off rice cakes they made for Korea’s Chuseok holiday in the central city of Gongju on Sept. 9, 2019. (Yonhap)
SEOUL, June 1 (Korea Bizwire) — Female immigrants working in South Korea tend to have higher educational attainment than their male counterparts, but they are typically paid lower wages, a study showed Monday.
The number of economically active female immigrants stood at 3,284,000, compared to 2,805,000 economically non-active female immigrants, according to a report from the state-run Migration Research and Training Centre.
Among the economically active female immigrants, the share of those with higher than university level education stood at 31.3 percent, higher than 28.8 percent for male immigrants.
For all kinds of stay qualifications, excluding H-2 working visit visas, marriage, and naturalization, the share of female immigrants with higher than university level education was higher than that of male immigrants.
Despite having higher educational attainment, female immigrants tended to receive lower wages than male immigrants.
The share of female immigrants with a monthly wage of 1-2 million won (US$902-1,805) stood at 48.2 percent, followed by those with a monthly wage of 2-3 million won (35.4 percent), less than 1 million won (12.2 percent) and higher than 3 million won (4.2 percent).
The share of male immigrants with a monthly wage of 2 to 3 million won was 54.3 percent, followed by those with a monthly wage of higher than 3 million won at 22.5 percent.
Moreover, 70.8 percent of the male immigrants with higher than university level education had permanent jobs, while the share of the female immigrants with a permanent job remained low at 55 percent.
J. S. Shin (js_shin@koreabizwire.com)
