Workshop 1: Globalization and Women's works & lives
Sub-group 1: Employment, Income generation, & promotion of women's economic education

Korean Women's Labor Situation in Time of Economic Crisis
                       
Ha Jin Jang
Professor
Dept of Sociology, Chungnam Nat'l Univ.
Korean Institute for Study on Women 

1. Globalization, Economic Crisis, and Women's Labor Force

The women's labor force in terms of economic crisis suffers a major blow under the pressure of the IMF.  The female workers become a primary target in the preemptive layout, unjust lay-off during the restructuring of the labor market and ensuing mass unemployment unavoidably demanded by the IMF. The possibility of their being re-employed appears very slim and women as a whole are alienated even to be considered beneficiaries, from the governmental unemployment program.
The causes that have brought the present economic crisis in Korea are considered from two sides. Internally, the system of big conglomeration (so-called Chaebol) has developed on an irresponsible wide scale, and this has been possible through the political-economic collusion, governmentally financed capital growth, and others. Externally, world capitalism has integrated the national markets into one in which now the capitalist competition operates without protective tariff. This implies no other than the fact that the interest of world financial capital overrules that of newly developing countries. 
The worldwide restructuring of economy has resulted in deepening the poverty of the absolute majority of the world population. As every nation is forced to squeeze out the purse of welfare fund, the major belows hit the shoulders of the female workers, whose situation is becoming more and more, a pauperized at the same time developing into a peripheral stratum.
The IMF demands, to Korea as to other countries, strained financial policies, devaluation of national currency, free trade, de-nationalization of major industries. In addition, it demands specifically the expanded market flexibility.  In response to such demand, the Korean Government supports legally institutionalizing the free flow of labor force as this helps bring in the foreign investment with the effect that the present monetary crisis of foreign exchange might be hopefully solved. 
      In the process of labor flexibility what is emphasized is not the flexibility of labor process, which would help increase the productivity and the quality of labor, but the flexibility in terms of wages and employment.   
Flexibility of this nature affects the female labor negatively both in qualitative and quantitative terms, and their position in labor market has drastically worsened accordingly.
      As of December 1997, the labor force participation rate of women shows 47.9% due to the rapid economic growth with average yearly rate of 8% over the last 30 years.  New job opportunities have been continuously offered to the female workers in the manufacturing and service industries.   
Yet the present unemployment rate is allegedly 7%, with 1.5million losing their jobs due to the bankruptcy of the enterprises and massive lay-offs. The National Statistical Office predicts that the number of the unemployed will even reach 1.8 million by the end of the year.
      The situation that the female work force should confront seems to be much more serious a ever before.  According to the report from the National Statistical Office of May 1998, the male population of the economically active has increased by 1.2% in comparison to the same period of last year with the 149 thousand employed, whereas the female decreased by 3.85% with the 340 thousand unemployed.  We have to consider an additional information that the economically-not-active female population that has left the labor market has increased by 6.7% with 590 thousand.
      Whereas the male clerical work force increased by 6.6%, the female counterpart decreased by 15.5% during the period. While the distribution of the male labor force shows 14.6% decrease only in the production occupations, the female labor force decreased in the service and sales, production, as well as professional and technical occupations, with the exception of agricultural-fishery.  By employment status, both male and female regular employees were decreased on large scale among the paid workers.   For women, the paid workers in general decreased by 9.9%, but the rate of decrease for those regular employees was 20.4%.  In particular, women's unemployment rate becomes much worse along those young-age and high-educated strata. 
      As the economic depression continues, it is very likely that the unemployed women would give up seeking a job and fall into the category of economically not active. If we include this discouraged unemployment, the female unemployment rate will reach over 10%. One can not expect their re-entering the labor market with regular employment even in the period of economic recovery, and it signifies that the equal employment opportunity in the labor market will become further away for woman. 
      In short, it seems desirable, given present situation, for the government and the business to give first priority to job-keeping and, if necessary, to adopt the policy of job sharing through shortening work hours. The job sharing policy is intended to prevent the threat of the possible unemployment, but it has also positive effect in the long run to shorten the long work hours as well as expanding women's employment. 

2. Labor Market Flexibility and Women's Labor Situation

      The rapid expansion of labor flexibility under the pressure of the IMF and after the introduction of labor dispatchment system has especially worsened the stability of women's labor force. It is generally anticipated that, once the labor flexibility is expanded, the Korean labor market will suffer a qualitative change that produces negative impact on equal employment opportunity. Recent business bankruptcy and massive lay-offs reveal that the unemployment rate for women is more serious than for men.  Women's job trends to be irregular, thus marginalizing women in the labor market.
      The irregular employment, such as part-time temporary, dispatched, or daily employment has rapidly spread out among the females employed.  As of May 1998, male regular employees occupy 65.0% of the male paid workers, in comparison to 34.0% in women's case.   And about 80% of the part-time workers are women, and the rate tends to worsen as time goes.
      In addition to priority dismissal against the female workers, a more serious problem in women's labor is that the regular employees are replaced by the irregular employees. The contract for the latter means approximately a half wage accompanied by various disadvantages during the period of employment. 
      The female irregular employees work in fact the same hours, under the same labor intensity, and with the same work as the regular workers, but they are unequally treated, according to the needs of the employers for cutting the wage, in preparation for the fluctuation of labor demand and for the labor control. Those female irregular employees suffer from job instability, with low wages, and without any welfare benefits. As the practice of labor dispatchment becomes usual, they must undergo the situation of double exploitation. The entire labor market must eventually experience the sense of instability, for  the regular employees too will  be threatened  for  their employment and wage security.
      The government says that the flexibility of labor market will help decrease the unemployment rate as seen in the United States and the Great Britain. However, the female work force are concentrated in the small companies with fewer than 5 workers, in low-paid and in non-skilled jobs, being excluded from the employment insurance and benefits of various unemployment programs.
      At present, the Korean society has a very weak basic social security system, in terms of, medical care, educational and other livelihood subsidies. If we are not to provide a sufficient social safety net for the unemployed, it is all too evident that the women's life quality will rapidly fall to the ground because of their employment instability. 

3. Problems in Job-Training for Women

      The Korean Government has emphasized the crucial importance of vocational training of unemployed women, even though the public policy of the government in response to the present situation of on-going mass unemployment includes the efforts to maintain the present level of employment, search for new sources of employment, protection of minimum life subsidies, and to help the unemployed with successful relocation through vocational training. The reason for focusing on job-training at the moment is that the on-going large scale unemployment appears to be inevitable due to the structural adjustments, while job creating is highly limited by the reduced expenditure. Even the Minister of Labor made it clear that  "the government's policy on unemployment is rather than to produce welfare-dependent persons with subsidizing but to train them for re-employment".  The target number for job training this year is 320 thousand, and 154 thousand have already been trained. The rate for re-entry into the labor market is very low, however, due to depression.
      The job-training program or re-entry to those unemployed women workers, is important in improving competitiveness in the labor market once the restructuring is completed. There are many qualitative as well as quantitative problems, however.
      The sex ratio of the trainees admitted to the job training program since March 1998 is highly unbalanced, i. e. 64% for male in comparison to only 36% for female.  Furthermore, there are several disadvantages attached to those female trainees which may be summarized as follows:
  -Concentration on the traditional female jobs such as beauty palor, cooking, or simple clerical work.
  -Related to low income jobs in comparison to the other fields.
  -Job-training period is shorter for women than for men. 
  -The training program for women is not linked to the prospects in the labor market and tends to be hobby-like activities. 
  -The training program is not sufficiently diversified and is not specialized enough to meet the demands of various social strata.
  -The category of jobs is traditional, rather than futuristic. 
      In particular, the vocational training programs for those newly unemployed, either low-aged or high-educated group, opens only a narrow door to women, yet the future labor market  is likely to be occupied by those qualified from the program.