An Era Where Part-Timers Earn More... "Minimum Wage Out of Touch with Reality"

The minimum wage for next year has been set at 10,700 KRW per hour.

This is an increase of 380 KRW, or 3.7 percent, from this year's minimum wage.

When converted to a monthly salary, it amounts to 2,236,300 KRW, an increase of approximately 79,000 KRW.

The minimum wage increase rate, which was 5 percent in 2023, remained in the 1 to 2 percent range for the following three years before rising back to the 3 percent range this time.

It is estimated that 3 million workers are affected by the minimum wage.

Those earning the minimum wage complained that, given the recent high inflation rate, a 3.7 percent increase is equivalent to a wage cut.

[Lee Hong-jun / Non-regular Post Office Worker (Korean Public Service and Transport Workers' Union): For non-regular workers or those working part-time jobs like us, the minimum wage acts as a wage ceiling. If it increases by such a small amount, it creates significant difficulties in making a living...]

Self-employed business owners appealed that they are already under heavy pressure due to rising material costs, and that any further increase in the minimum wage would push them to their limits.

[Choi Cha-soo / Restaurant Owner: Self-employed people are in a very difficult situation these days. As the minimum hourly wage goes up, the number of employees we can hire decreases.]

Amid dissatisfaction from both labor and management, the Minimum Wage Commission has officially recommended that the government improve the minimum wage system, including the application of the minimum wage to contract-based workers, as previously reported exclusively by SBS.

During this year's Minimum Wage Commission, the issue of applying the minimum wage to contract-based workers, such as delivery riders, was discussed as an agenda item for the first time in history, but it was rejected due to opposition from the management side.

[Kwon Soon-won / Chair of the Minimum Wage Commission: We have recommended that the Ministry of Employment and Labor take full responsibility for the entire process, from setting the agenda to discussing the details within a task force, while taking the current reality into account.]

Kwon Soon-won, Chair of the Minimum Wage Commission, emphasized that since the framework of the minimum wage has remained largely unchanged for nearly 40 years, there are aspects that no longer align with reality, and that the government needs to review the system as a whole.

Reported by Jeon Hyung-woo | Written by Kim Da-yeon | Video by Kang Dong-chul and Lee Jae-young | Video Editing by Park Na-young | Produced by SBS Digital News
※ Please note: This article was translated by AI and may contain errors.