Almost 1 million workers joined unions under previous government

[Photo by Han Joo-hyung]

Nearly 1 million workers in South Korea joined a labor union during the five years under the previous Moon Jae-in government and the union membership rate reached 14.2 percent in 2021, the highest since 1994, data showed Sunday.

The number of labor union workers reached 2.933 million at the end of last year, up 128,000 from the previous year, according to data from the Ministry of Employment and Labor.

A separate analysis by Maeil Business Newspaper showed that the number of union workers increased the most during the five years under President Moon. Nearly 1 million workers - or 967,000 - joined union groups, which is significantly high compared with four previous governments under former Presidents Kim Dae-jung, Roh Moo-hyun, Lee Myung-bak and Park Geun-hye.

The increase was more than five times of that of the 185,000 gain during the five years of former President Park and 12 times of former President Roh.

The number of members with the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions increased 564,000 during the previous Moon government and Federation of Korean Trade Unions rose 396,000.

Union membership rate during the Moon administration also rose 3.9 percentage points to 14.2 percent in 2021 from 10.3 percent in 2016, analysis showed.

The rate fell 0.6 percentage point, 0.8 percentage point and 0.5 percentage point during the first and final governing years of former presidents Kim, Roh and Lee, respectively. The rate was unchanged at 10.3 percent under former President Park.

The union membership rate at companies with 300 or more employees reached 46.3 percent at the end of December last year and at public sector was 70 percent. The rate at companies with 30~99 employees, on the other hand, remained low at 1.6 percent and those with less than 30 workers at 0.2 percent.

Employees at large companies and public enterprises are offered more opportunity to join labor union groups while those at small companies that need social protection are not.

“This shows the reality of how the local union isn’t representing vulnerable workers of small businesses,” said Lee Jung-han, head of labor policy at the Ministry of Employment and Labor.