An old man pushing a trolley loaded with cardboard for recycling, a common scene in South Korea, where a rising number of elderly people live in poverty. (Yonhap)
SEOUL, June 22 (Korea Bizwire) — More than half of the income earned by seniors in South Korea turned out to be labor wages, indicating that a lot of seniors still work after retirement to sustain their livelihood, a report said Tuesday.
The report titled “Pensions at a glance 2021″ published by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) showed that 52 percent of income earned by Korean seniors was labor income, followed by public transfer income such as pensions (25.9 percent) and capital income from savings and private pensions (22.1 percent).
Only seniors from South Korea and Mexico depended on labor income by more than 50 percent, exceeding the OECD average of 25.8 percent.
This indicates that seniors, without sufficient enjoyment of benefits from public pensions or national welfare subsidies, are being forced back into the workforce.
Only seniors from South Korea, Mexico, Chile and Israel depended on public pensions by less than 20 percent.
The study showed that South Korea had the highest rate of senior poverty.
The relative poverty rate of the senior population, which points to those below the 50-percent hurdle of the median income, stood at 43.4 percent, which was three times higher than the OECD average of 13.1 percent.
H. M. Kang (hmkang@koreabizwire.com)
