This photo, taken on Jan. 11, 2021, shows people waiting to apply for emergency employment stabilization funds and unemployment benefits at the employment center of the labor ministry in Seoul as the COVID-19 pandemic hit the job market. (Yonhap)
SEOUL, Jan. 18 (Korea Bizwire) — Young Korean job seekers in their 20s and 30s are suffering from ever-increasing stress in the midst of the extreme job crisis featuring the combination of a stagnant job market and the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic.
A growing number of cases have been reported in which stress has evolved from a sense of helplessness and depression into violent behavior.
On January 7, the statue of the Virgin Mary installed in the yard of a church in Busan was hit by a large thrown rock with its length and width estimated at about 20 centimeters each. The thrown rock damaged the arm and waist of the statue.
The culprit, who was arrested five days later, was a job seeker in his 20s. It was found that he committed such a crime due to the stress that had accumulated from failing to land a job.
In late November 2020, a 27-year-old job seeker was arrested by the police after he scratched five cars with sharp objects in the middle of the night. The cars were parked in an alley in Seoul.
In this file photo taken Nov. 11, 2020, jobseekers look around booths of a job fair in the Convention and Exhibition Center in southern Seoul. (Yonhap)
The ever-increasing stress facing young people in their 20s and 30s is also reflected in the statistics that show the number of patients with somatization disorders is increasing, particularly among young people.
According to data from the Health Insurance Review and Assessment Service, the number of individuals in their 20s who visited Oriental medicine clinics due to somatization disorders totaled 1,477 in 2019, doubling the total reported five years ago.
The number of such individuals in their 30s was up by 50 percent over the same period.
Taking into consideration young individuals who received treatment at general hospitals that tend to diagnose somatization disorder as depression or other anxiety disorders, the number of such patients would be far higher than the data showed.
In March of 2020, the job search portal Job Korea conducted a survey of 2,980 new entrant and mid-career job seekers, 89.3 percent of whom said that they were suffering from high stress due to their inability to find a job.
Another 69.4 percent of the respondents said that when they experienced job stress, they felt the sense of fatigue and helplessness, followed by 58.2 percent who mentioned ‘depression’ and 32.3 percent said they were ‘overly sensitive and short tempered.’
J. S. Shin (js_shin@koreabizwire.com)
