The number of employed people decreased by 137,000! The epidemic has hurt Korean women more than men

The coronavirus pandemic that hit South Korea last year affected female workers more than male workers, according to government statistics and think tanks.

The number of employed women in South Korea fell by 137,000 last year from a year earlier , far outstripping the 82,000 jobs lost by men, according to a government report .

 
The Korea Women's Development Institute also released a survey on Monday , in which a total of 3,007 female workers aged between 20 and 59 participated.

One in five women surveyed lost their job following the outbreak of the coronavirus pandemic. Four in 10 respondents who lost their jobs or were furloughed during the pandemic said female employees, pregnant employees or those on parental leave were the first to be affected by layoffs or furloughs at work.

The survey also showed that women in their 20s and 30s were more likely to lose their jobs during the pandemic. Nearly 30 % of respondents in their 20s and 19.5% of respondents in their 30s said they lost their jobs following the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic. The proportion of women in their 40s and 50s was smaller, at 18.4% and 18.5% respectively.

Both reports noted that South Korean women are more likely to be employed in service industries such as retail, food and education, which often require face-to-face communication and have a large proportion of small companies, so employers are more likely not to provide paid leave or pay unemployment benefits during the epidemic, making them more vulnerable in the economic downturn.

In addition to company issues, career interruptions due to marriage and childbirth are also the biggest obstacle for women to continue working.

The South Korean government's report also mentioned that "with the closure of schools and kindergartens, South Korean women have taken on the main responsibility of raising children, which has led to a large number of them voluntarily choosing to leave the workplace."

South Korea's fertility rate hit a record low of 0.84 last year , but an increase in the number of economically active women is helping the birth rate and population, according to an analysis of OECD statistics by the Federation of Korea Industries (FKI).

This year, the South Korean government has allocated an additional budget to create 77,000 jobs for female workers , bringing the target of newly created female positions in South Korea to 780,000.

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Employment