Korea's Slumping Economy to Put Strain on Job Market [Arirang News]

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With the cental bank forecasting that Korea's economic growth will stay in the two percent range this year, job seekers will face an uphill battle ahead.

Yoo Li-an reports.

Korea's job market doesn't look so good this year, with the country's growth expected to stay below three percent yet again.

The Bank of Korea said on Tuesday that the nation's real GDP grew by merely two percent in 2012, just half the country's potential growth rate of nearly four percent.

Bank officials figure economic growth of each percentage point usually creates an average of 89-thousand new jobs a year.

Despite the poor economc performance last year, the total number of new jobs that were created was over four times that ... making it the best year in a decade in terms of job creation.

So what does this mean then?

About HALF of those new jobs were created by female and senior citizens ... who set up restaurants or other businesses of their own to sustain their livelihood.

And as the country's growth forecast was repeatedly revised down as the year came to an end last year .... from three-point-seven percent to two percent,... the nation's monthly employment figures fell accordingly.

Now with this year's economic growth projected at two-point-eight percent, competition is expected to only get fiercer for the limited number of jobs.

The bad news is that the dire outlook is for all job seekers -- those in their 20s, women, senior citizens, baby boomers in their 50s and 60s, and part-time workers.

Yoo Li-an, Arirang News.

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