South Korea's economically active elderly people hit record high in 2024

South Korea's economically active elderly population hit a record high this year amid the rapidly aging population, statistical office data showed Tuesday.
The number of those aged 55-79 totaled 15,983,000 in May, up by 502,000 from a year earlier, according to Statistics Korea.

Of the total, those engaged in economic activities reached the highest 60.6 per cent. It was up by 0.4 percentage points from a year earlier.

Among the age group, employment rate rose 0.1 percentage point to hit a new high of 59.0 percent, while jobless rate gained 0.3 percentage points to 2.5 per cent.

The elderly hiring rate continued to increase from 53.1 per cent in 2013 to 55.2 per cent in 2018 and 58.9 per cent in 2023.

Of the elderly employed, the largest 12.8 per cent was engaged in the health care and social welfare sector, followed by the agricultural, livestock and fishery industry with 12.4 per cent and the manufacturing industry with 12.2 per cent.

The data showed that 69.4 percent of the age group hoped to continue or begin to work in the future, Xinhua news agency reported.

Among the worker-hopefuls, 52.3 per cent wanted a full-time job, while 47.7 per cent wanted to serve as part-timers.