A customer chooses a Chuseok gift set at a large shopping store in Seoul. (Image courtesy of Yonhap)
SEOUL, Aug. 31 (Korea Bizwire) — Real wages, after adjusting for inflation, experienced a decline of 1.5 percent year-on-year during the first half of the current year, as revealed by a recent survey.
This marks a significant turning point since 2011 when the Ministry of Employment and Labor expanded its survey coverage to encompass “enterprises with one or more commercial employees.” Insights based on this parameter have been accessible since 2012.
According to the ‘July Business Labor Force Survey’ published by the Ministry of Labor on August 31, the average monthly gross wage per employee (amounting to KRW 3.98 million) in businesses with at least one commercial worker registered a 2.4 percent increase (equivalent to KRW 92,000) year-on-year from January to June.
Nevertheless, when considering the average monthly real wage per employee, which is adjusted to account for inflation, it was recorded as KRW 3.58 million for the January-June period. This represents a decline of 1.5% (equivalent to KRW 55,000) in comparison to the same period in the previous year (KRW 3.63 million).
The situation demonstrates that even with the rise in nominal wages, the actual purchasing power of employees has diminished due to the escalated inflation.
In the meantime, the minimum wage for the upcoming year (9860 won) is slated to undergo a mere 2.5 percent increase from the preceding year’s 9620 won. This marks the second-lowest increment in history.
Lina Jang (linajang@koreabizwire.com)
