Work Culture in South Korea

In this podcast episode, the host, Jason, interviews his guest, Yohan, about work culture in Korea. They discuss the financial struggles faced by Koreans, such as the gap between salaries and housing prices. They also talk about gender discrimination and how it affects women in the workplace. The younger generation is choosing careers over starting families, leading to a low birth rate. The government has tried to address these issues, but more understanding and support are needed. Hello, everybody. This is Jason Podcast. Welcome to my show. Today, I have a special guest. Can you introduce yourself, please? Hello, my name is Yohan Lee. I'm from South Korea and currently attending SLU. I'm a sophomore majoring in computer science. Welcome to my podcast. Is this your first time to attend the podcast? Yes, it is. It's my first time. Are you nervous? Yes, I am. Don't be nervous. This show provides a casual vibe. How have you been? How's your week this week? It's a busy week because I'm preparing for my final exams and my papers. How's your week going? I think pretty same as you. I have a final papers like final quiz or test waiting for me. It's a tough week. We have a winter break next week, right? Do you have any plans for the winter break? My original plan was to go to Las Vegas in this winter break because my aunt lives there. But because of medical reason, I have to go back to South Korea. Oh, really? Are you sick or hurt? A year ago, I had a herniated disc. It was okay. But when I came back in this semester, it got worse. I couldn't 100% focus on the studying thing. I thought this was serious. I might come back six months later or two years later. What about your winter break? Is there any plan? I'm just staying here. Maybe just work out and play some basketball and video games. One of my friends told me that you are like Stephen Curry. It's not true? Are you ready to get started? Yes, I am. Today's topic is work culture in Korea. It is a big topic not only in South Korea but also all around the world might have this problem. Is there a reason why you chose this topic? Yes, the reason why I chose this topic is because I was born and raised in South Korea for 20 years. So I'm very familiar with this problem. Moreover, I wanted my generation and the upper generation to collaborate and understand each other. Because in the work field, there are different generations working together. Furthermore, if I had an argument and said what is right or wrong, maybe the older generation could be emotional or do not want to listen to this podcast. That is the reason why our podcast is casual. Oh, okay. I understand. Then is work culture related to money or is it related to culture? Both are related and both are right. First, do you know how average amount of money Koreans make per year? I think about 40 million won, which will be like $30,000. That is close. Kindicator said it is 35.26 million won, which is $26,000. I'm weak at the number of things. So I think if people don't know the prices in Korea, people may not know whether this is a big or small amount of money. So I brought the prices for the apartment unit ownership in Seoul. Because like 70% or 80% in Korea lived in apartments. Oh, really? Yes. And according to Daily Economy, which is a famous article site, it said apartment unit ownership prices in Seoul have increased to an average of $738,000 over the past 18 years. Wow, there's a big gap between the salary and the house. Yes, it is. By the way, I found an interesting quote from Daily Economy. It says if you want to buy your own house in Seoul, you have to save for 36 years without spending any salary. No way. It's a funny line, but in reality, it's a very sad sentence. Yes, that's true. I mean, in other words, it's kind of impossible to buy your own house in Seoul, right? Yeah. Even OECD, which is an organization for economic cooperation and development, said South Korea has some of the longest work weeks out of the 38 nations. It shows even though they work hard, they do make less money than we thought. Okay, now I get to know better about the salary. But how does this relate to the work culture? For women, the work culture is different from men. Yohan, do you know the history of Korea? Yes, of course I do. Then you would naturally know how women had lack of rights and got lots of discrimination in the past. Yeah, and in the modern era, we can see discrimination when we see the older generation like our grandparents. Do you have any experience? Yes, I have. When I went to my grandparents' house about when I was like fifth grade, I mean between elementary and middle school, I went to a kitchen to drink water, just to drink water. However, my grandmother yelled at me and said, how can a man come to a kitchen? Get out. No way. It is true story. Do you have any experience or a story that you heard? This is not my story, but what I heard from one of my high school friends was that whenever he goes to his grandparents' house, men and women had to eat their food in different places, and sometimes women had to wait until the man finishes eating. Also, after done eating, it was woman's job to do all the dish cleaning and stuff. That's tough. And because of the older generation getting discriminated, the younger generation does not want to follow their parents' path. There's a perfect example of this situation. In NPR, Yoon Jong Kim explains that when she was young, she saw her mother raising three children and struggling. Moreover, she explains the reality is that one of the parents had to resign from work or take a long break. But the problem is, it's almost always the female or the mom who has to take the lead. And one more thing, Yoon Jong Kim, she has a Korean citizenship and she lived for her entire life. So, the younger generation saw their mothers with no choices other than taking care of their children in-house, so they do not want to be stuck in that situation. So, they are choosing a career over their family, right? That is perfectly correct. And even considering the company's position and business position, if you choose someone who is pregnant or wants to have a child, it is more advantageous to not have a child or choose a man than not to fill the gap when they have a baby. Wow. If I were a woman in the position, I have to choose a baby or a career. That is true. Can you expect what is the next problem because of the war culture? Maybe about things like low birth rate? Yes. Do you know COSIS? It is a site. I never heard about it. It is a national statistical portal that is run by the Korean government. In there, there are interesting numbers. The 1960 graph shows 26.5 million people with 43.3% of them being 14 years old or younger. The reason for this smaller and younger population is that there were many casualties in the war between North and South Korea in the early 1950s. In 2023, there are currently 51.5 million people and 11% of them are 14 years old or younger. Moreover, by 2070, the COSIS predicts that there will be only 37.6 million people and only 7.5% are 14 or younger. Yes. Even they predict. What this means according to COSIS is, in the past, which is 1960, there was less population than current day. But the problem is, in 1960, the population of 43.3% youth. However, in 2023, the youth population is only 11%. To summarize, many babies were born in 1960 and their children grew up to make the current population of 50 million. But they did not have children at the same rate of their parents. So, the population is large now, but statistics shows that the number of children is not large. This means that the number of elderly people will increase and children will gradually disappear. And in the future, the population will decrease. Wow, that is a very interesting statistic. Even the government knows this. But why are they not doing something? Well, they did, but it did not work well. Compared to the past, the gender equality has improved a lot. However, people with a mind of the old era say the women should have children. But they do not provide anything with welfare country to it or try to understand them. Well, maybe if the older generation can understand our generation, maybe the low birth rate can be changed, right? Yes, I think the most important thing is to understand each other. I think that's all we have time for today. Thank you for accepting my invitation, Yuan. Of course, it was my pleasure. We will post a new episode next week. Thank you for listening and have a nice day.