New Hires in Big Businesses Dwindle
05 November, 2018
New hires at big businesses have declined for the first time in five years, providing further ammunition to critics who say the government's job creation policies have badly misfired.
The government has claimed that the quality of jobs has increased despite a lack of marked quantitative growth, but a closer look at the figures shows that permanent jobs in big conglomerates are dwindling.
The average monthly salary at big conglomerates stood at W4.77 million in the first and second quarters of this year, compared to W3.35 million in small and mid-sized companies (US$1=W1,120).
According to the Labor Ministry, companies hired 2.34 million workers in the first nine months of this year, up around 97,000 from the same period of 2017, although the rate of growth has halved.
But the new hires are mainly concentrated in lower-paying jobs in businesses that employ less than 300 workers. They hired 75,000 more workers than last year. Another 17,000 new temporary jobs were created in small and mid-sized companies but only 5,000 in big businesses.
In contrast, the number of full-time positions at big businesses fell from 133,800 last year to 132,000 this year.