Seo, a woman in her 30s, started working part-time at a cafe while preparing for employment, thinking, “I’ll work for a while” because she didn’t want to ask her parents for help. She has been doing this for two years. She is guaranteed minimum wage and receives holiday pay, and her income is not as low as she thought, so at some point, the roles of preparing for employment and working part-time were reversed. Seo said, “I worked for a while at a small business, but the workload was too high compared to the amount of work and salary,” and “I don’t know when I’ll quit working part-time.”

Due to job insecurity, lack of quality jobs, economic downturn, and minimum wage increases, positive perceptions of ‘freeters’ who make a living through part-time jobs are spreading. Freeters are a compound word of ‘free’ and ‘Arbeiter’, and they are a word that originated in Japan and refers to people who make a living through part-time jobs without a specific job. In particular, as the proportion of freeters and positive perceptions are increasing among middle-aged and older people, some analysis suggests that the ‘era of part-time jobs for life’ has begun.

According to a survey conducted by Alba Heaven, a portal site specializing in part-time job recruitment and job seeking, from the 8th to the 14th of last month on 3,253 individual members at the request of the Korea Economic Daily, 28.5% of part-time job seekers and job seekers responded that they were ‘freeters’. In particular, the ’30s’, who should be working hard, accounted for 37.6%, the highest at 4 out of 10. The 40s followed with 30.2%, and the 50s with 26.2%.

In particular, the percentage of respondents who had a ‘positive’ perception of freeters was very high at 75.4%. In particular, 82.3% of those in their 30s, 79.2% of those in their 40s, and 68.9% of those in their 50s or older responded ‘positively’, revealing that positive perceptions of ‘freeters’ are spreading among the middle-aged and older age groups.

In fact, the number of part-time job applications in the first half of 2024 has increased by 35.4% compared to the first half of 2019, five years ago. According to Alba Heaven, by age, there has been a 166.7% increase in those in their 40s and a 443.2% increase in those in their 50s and older.

According to a survey of people who responded that they are ‘freeters’, the reason for becoming a freeter was ‘difficulty in finding regular employment due to career gaps’, which took first place with 34.9%, 41.7%, and 33.3% for those in their 30s, 40s, and 50s, respectively. Other reasons were ‘no choice due to the difficulty in finding employment’ and ‘continuing with a part-time job that I started instead of finding a job’.

Among those who responded that they are not freeters, a significant number responded that they “could become freeters.” 55.8% of those in their 30s, 59.3% of those in their 40s, and 52.6% of those in their 50s and older responded that they “intend to become freeters someday.” The most common reason given was “difficulty finding new jobs due to employment difficulties and career gaps.” Alba Heaven explains that this shows that anxiety about the recession and job competitiveness is also spreading.

However, it was revealed that the most common type of freeter is working only one part-time job, rather than working multiple N-jobs like before. Among those who responded that they are freeters, 58.8% were working one part-time job, and 32.7% were working two part-time jobs. Only 8.6% responded that they were working three or more. The percentage of freeters working one job was the highest among those in their 30s, at 57.3%, and among those in their 40s, at 50.9%. Alba Heaven analyzed that “this is because salaries such as the minimum wage have increased, and the employment conditions themselves have become worse,” and “it seems that the culture that values ​​work-life balance has also had an influence.”

The monthly income of freeters from part-time jobs was mostly less than 1 to 2 million won. 32.5% of those in their 30s, 34.4% of those in their 40s, and 42.7% of those in their 50s and older responded that they received 1 to 2 million won. 500,000 won to 1 million won followed with 28.2%, 27.6%, and 32.0%, respectively.

Excluding those in their 20s, the most common response from all generations was working in the service industry, including store management, cashiers, and kitchen assistants, while the second most common industry was the food and beverage industry.

The biggest disadvantages of freeter were ‘uncertain future’ (39.9%), low income (34.9%), and social prejudice (17.0%). Nevertheless, 19.2% of those in their 30s and 22.7% of those in their 40s responded that they “have no plans to quit being a freeter.” This means that they are satisfied with their freeter life. On the other hand, more than half (57.3% and 45%, respectively) responded that they plan to quit within the next year.

According to Statistics Korea, the number of part-time workers among non-regular workers was 3,873,000 as of August last year, an increase of 186,000 from the same month the previous year. In addition, the proportion of part-time workers (working less than 36 hours a week) in Korea has been steadily increasing since 2003 (6.5%), nearly tripling to 17.6% last year.

The analysis is that as there is a shortage of ‘good’ regular jobs with job security and high wages, the number of workers who choose to make a living through part-time jobs is increasing. In the past, the minimum wage in Korea was much lower than in Japan, so there was a perception that freeters were exclusive to Japan, but there is also analysis that Japan’s ‘freeter culture’ has rapidly spread to Korea as the minimum wage in Korea has skyrocketed.

As the number of middle-aged job seekers in their 40s and older has increased, Alba Heaven has created a separate ‘middle-aged employment center.’ A Alba Heaven official explained, “The perception that part-time jobs are exclusive to people in their 20s is disappearing,” and “We are hiring actors in their 30s and 40s as models and running the ‘All Life, All Part-Time Jobs’ campaign to reflect the changes in the short-term job market.”

Reporter Kwak Yong-hee kyh@hankyung.com