[The Fountain] The irony of the working poor

Anyone who works hard should not be poor — the cry from “The Working Poor” from 20 years ago — is some far-fetched story for Koreans today.

CHO HYUN-SOOKThe author is a business news reporter for the JoongAng Ilbo. “The working poor” are workers who cannot get out of poverty no matter how hard they work. The term became known through a book of the same title published in the United States in 2004. New York Times journalist David Shipler interviewed and researched the realities of the American working class, who become only poorer even though they work tirelessly.

He paid attention to the individuals who cannot escape poverty even if they work night and day because of the flawed social system, bad employers and illness from hard work.

The book includes an example of Korean immigrants. The owner of a Korean restaurant exploits cooks and wait staff by manipulating their work logs. A Korean family came to the U.S. for one of its members to get a doctorate, but the whole family fell into poverty.

The book caused a sensation after overturning the conventional idea that poverty is a product of laziness. Other countries conducted similar research. Now, the working poor has become a term representing poor working-class individuals.

On April 2, the Korea Enterprises Federation (KEF) presented a report on the analysis of the ratio of below-the-minimum-wage workers and an international comparison of minimum wage levels. According to the data from Statistics Korea, 2.756 million Korean workers, or 12.7 percent of the entire workforce, are receiving the minimum wage. Among the 25 countries of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, Korea has the second-highest percentage of minimum wage earners after Mexico.

The KEF may have wanted to emphasize that Korea’s minimum wage is higher than other countries. But it actually spotlighted the dark side of the domestic labor market.

Last year’s minimum wage in Korea was about 1.91 million won ($1,452) per month, less than the minimum monthly living cost for living for a single-person household, a dual-income household or a single-person household with two to four members.

The minimum cost of living is the minimum expense needed for humane living, according to the National Basic Living Security Act. But the KEF finding shows how large the working poor population is in Korea.

Other statistics point to a similar reality. According to data from Statistics Korea, titled “Characteristics of the Employed by Industry and Occupation,” 9.4% of the 21.56 million wage workers earned less than 1 million won per month in the first half of 2022. Those who earn between 1 million won and 2 million won a month also accounted for 15.9%. Simply put, one in four Koreans makes a minimum wage or less than the minimum living cost for a household with two to three members.

Anyone who works hard should not be poor — the cry from “The Working Poor” from 20 years ago — is some far-fetched story for Koreans today.