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Vice Prime Minister Hong Nam-ki and the Minister of Strategy and Finance will chair the Meeting of Ministers (Noxil Meeting) on the 16th. At the conference, participants assessed the November employment trend as “a relatively good level for comparisons. international “. Provided by the Ministry of Strategy and Finance.
The cold wave in employment has reached its worst level since the financial crisis in 1998. Employment declined for 9 consecutive months, already exceeding the level of the financial crisis in 2009. The number of people who said they simply “rested” without doing nothing ever soared to the max. Despite this situation, the government is being told that it is imperative to highlight the positive side when evaluating that “our labor situation is relatively good when compared internationally” by bringing inconvenient international statistics.
The fall in employment is more serious than the financial crisis
According to the November employment trend published by the National Statistics Office on the 16th, the number of people employed last month was 27,241,000, 273,000 less than in the same month last year. It’s a decline for the ninth month in a row since the new coronavirus infection crisis (Corona 19) began in March. After the 16th consecutive month of employment decline from January 1998 to April 1999, during the financial crisis, the longest decline has continued. The record of eight consecutive months of decline in January-August 2009, during the global financial crisis, has already been broken.
The decline in the number of people employed increased to 274,000 in August, 392,000 in September and 421,000 in October, and then fell temporarily last month. On October 12, the government explained that employment was temporarily reactivated as social distancing to the first stage eased. On the other hand, the increase in the distancing stage from the reproliferation of Corona 19 last month was not reflected in most of these statistics. This is because it has gradually improved since mid-November and hardly overlaps with the period covered by this employment trends survey.
The employment rate last month was 60.7%. It was down 1.0 percentage point from the same month last year. The number of people who responded that they did nothing and simply “ rested ” was 2,353,000, the highest since November 2003, when the statistics were prepared.
Rise of the public and the elderly versus the decline of manufacturing and youth
The quality of employment is also deteriorating. While the number of public and senior jobs increased significantly, the number of jobs in industry and youth decreased significantly. Last month, the number of employees aged 60 and over increased by 372,000. However, the rest of the age groups, including 20 (-209,000), 30 (-194,000), 40 (-135,000), and 50 (-74,000), declined.
By industry, the number of employees in the public administration, national defense and the social security administration increased by 152,000. The rate of increase reached 13.6%. The health services and social welfare industries also increased by 114,000, registering an increase of 5.0%. It is analyzed that the direct jobs provided by the government, mainly to the elderly, contributed to the reduction in the number of employed persons.
On the other hand, the manufacturing industry, which is classified as a decent job, is also experiencing a worsening of the employment crisis. The decrease in the number of employed persons increased from 98,000 in October to 113,000 in November. Hospitality and restaurant businesses (-161,000 people) and wholesale and retail businesses (-166,000 people) were found to have been particularly vulnerable to the impact of Corona 19, as they were focused on face-to-face services.
The number of permanent workers, that is, salaried workers with a contract of more than one year, only increased by 38,000 compared to the same month the previous year. Although it increased slightly from last month, it is the smallest increase in about 20 years since December 1999 (-56,000 people) during the financial crisis. The number of unemployed was 967,000, an increase of 101,000 over the previous year. The unemployment rate was 3.4%, 0.3 percentage points more than a year ago.
The government says that “the employment situation is relatively good.”
On the same day, Vice Premier Hong Nam-ki and Minister of Strategy and Finance held a meeting of relevant ministers (noxil meeting) and discussed the employment situation with Minister of Employment and Labor Lee Jae-gap, Choi Ki-young , the Minister of Science and Technology, Information and Communication, Koo Yoon-cheol, head of the Office for the Coordination of State Affairs, Gang Shin-wook, official of the House of Statistics and Lee Ho-the Blue. According to the Ministry of Information, the attendees pointed out that “although the decline in employment has been maintained for 9 months, it is positive that the employment situation has improved compared to October.”
At the Noksil Conference it was mentioned that the growth / decline rate of employment in Korea as of November was -1.0%, better than Germany (-1.3%), Japan (-1.4%), United Kingdom (-2.6%) and the United States (-6.0%). This served as the basis for the assessment that the employment situation was relatively good. However, in this process the cases of the Netherlands (-0.5%) and Australia (-1.0%), which are similar or better than Korea, were not mentioned.
The biggest problem is that the statistics for countries other than the United States and Canada were from last October, not last month. In October, the rate of increase / decrease of employment in Korea was -1.5%. The decline was larger than in the Netherlands and Australia, as well as Germany and Japan, which were suggested as countries with worse employment than Korea. It is pointed out that it is more natural for the assessment that “our employment situation is relatively worse in international comparison” comes out.
This is the reason why some point out that the government arbitrarily brought in statistics that suit their tastes and made a wrong assessment. It is pointed out as a problem that the aspect of job quality was not considered by comparing only the total amount, not by industry and age.
Also, considering the recent update to step 3 of social distancing, criticism has emerged that crisis response should be emphasized rather than positive assessment. An official from the Ministry of Science and Technology added: “As the recent reproliferation of Corona 19 may have a significant impact on the employment rate in December, participants shared their perception that it is necessary to pay special attention to the situation of the labor market.” .
Reporter Kang Jin-kyu [email protected]
