July 7, 2025
SEOUL – More young, unmarried South Koreans living with their parents, tend to express less desire to work over the past decade, according to a new report by the state-run Korea Labor Institute.
The report, released in late June, analyzes a decade of data from 2015 to 2024 based on Statistics Korea’s annual survey of the economically inactive population — focusing on individuals aged 19 to 39 who are not actively seeking employment.
According to the research institute, 56.1 percent of economically inactive youth living at home with their parents had showed willingness to seek employment in 2015. But the figure gradually declined to 50 percent in 2024, suggesting the desire to actively participate in economic activities has weakened over the past 10 years.
The same report highlighted that the number of young Koreans who are willing to work but believe they have no chance of getting a job increased from 5,382 to 175,000 over the past decade, citing lack of work experience, education and suitable positions for their educational background.
The number of those who felt they have job opportunities decreased from 79,643 to 14,882.
Meanwhile, the Korea Labor Institute noted that almost 2.73 million young Koreans — accounting for some 77 percent of the economically inactive population in 2024 — reported no intention to find a job.
About 20 percent expressed the willingness to work but had not engaged in activities related to a job search within the past four weeks, according to the report.
The report stated that the percentage of those who said they would be able to work if offered a job decreased significantly from 54 percent to 31 percent during the same period between 2015 and 2024.
The institute explained that this sharp drop could be attributed to the impact of COVID-19.
The Korea Labor Institute identified resting, education and child care as the top three reasons for youth economic inactivity over the past decade.
The report stated that the share of younger people engaged in child care dropped sharply from 26.8 percent to 13.8 percent over the decade. But those categorized as resting doubled from 10.5 percent to 20 percent.
The proportion of those attending school remained relatively stable over the 10-year period.
The report noted that youth economic activity tends to stabilize after the age of 26.
While many young people experience repeated unemployment with short-term jobs until their mid-20s, they tend to fall into two different groups by ages 25 or 26: one that stabilizes into employment and another that shifts into long-term economic inactivity due to lack of work experience.
Though transitions in employment status are frequent before 28, significant changes are difficult to observe after this age, according to the employment and labor institute.
“While it is important to understand what proportion of youth are currently in a resting status, it is even more critical to identify how long each individual will remain in that state,” the Korea Labor Institute said in the report, explaining that a comprehensive measure to tackle the economically inactive population might not effectively respond to declining willingness to participate in labor among young Koreans.
sj_lee@heraldcorp.com