About minimum wage in Korea

I have not worked at café or restaurant but every when I go to crowded restaurant or café located in downtown, I can understand how hard part-timers work. But you know, almost part-timers get minimum wage 4,350 or 4,500 won per hour, and I think it does not correspond to strength of this kind of work. Owners just derive great benefits, they don’t care about part-timers’ wage. If you think about it, coffee is average 4,300 won at almost café and it is similar to part-timer’s one hour wage. And then some popular café in downtown would sell 100 cups of coffee every hour. Except various holding cost, like materials cost, electric charge and so on… amount of clear profit is huge. It’s no different from exploitation of labor.

I think Korean minimum wage is not realistic compare with Korean prices. Almost part-timers are university students who must raise so-called ‘spec’ in Korean and also gather money for tuition, travel cost or the poor who live with difficulty. But how many times do they work for gathering money? People say that it is good to travel or enjoy your time during living as a university student. I think it is difficult for common students. Also vicious circle of poverty keeps going, not improving their quality of life. It does not make sense.

And I heard minimum wage of next year, 2012 is 4580 won. But I think it is useless that 230 won increases compared with Korean prices increasing. Korean government would like to control minimum wage considering benefits between employer and employee immediately.