Rising trend of part-time youth employment

Lee, a 21-year-old college student, works part-time at a café in Gwangak-gu, Seoul, to earn an allowance four days a week, from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m., totaling just three hours per shift. Despite this brief work period, Lee spends an additional two hours commuting.

Having requested more hours, Lee was informed by the business owner that extending work hours would necessitate legally mandated holiday pay, which the owner could not afford. "There are very few part-time jobs available, and I was rejected from several after interviews because I lacked prior work experience," Lee explained. "The café where I currently work accepted me despite my inexperience. Although the hours are insufficient, I had no other option."

Last month, the number of young workers employed for less than 15 hours a week reached a record high of 450,000. This statistic indicates that nine out of 10 workers are not entitled to statutory benefits such as holiday pay, paid leave, or severance pay. These young workers are marginalized from various social insurance programs and are engaged in low-quality employment. Constrained by stagnant domestic consumption, small business owners increasingly rely on piecemeal employment, with adverse effects directly impacting young adults.

According to the Monthly Data on the Economically Active Population survey conducted by Statistics Korea, the number of employees in their 20s and 30s working less than 15 hours a week was reported to be 447,300, marking a 17 percent increase from the previous year's 382,300. This figure is the highest since January 2000, when such data began to be collected. Conversely, the total number of employees in their 20s and 30s fell to 9.107 million, a 1 percent decrease from the previous year. As job opportunities for young people decline, the quality of available jobs deteriorates due to the prevalence of piecemeal employment.

The rise in extremely short-time employment among the youth may lead to detrimental consequences, such as the deterioration of human capital, a cost borne by society as a whole. However, small business owners striving to reduce payroll expenses to stay afloat often have no choice but to employ workers on an extremely short-time basis, despite the challenges this poses in managing their workforce.

"The increase in extremely short-time work among the youth is due to the lack of quality jobs," said Ha Joon-gyeong, an economics professor at Hanyang University. "If young people continuously move from one short-term job to another during a period when they should be acquiring skills and developing human capital, they are likely to remain in low-skilled labor, negatively impacting their lifetime income."


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