Platform businesses that have been flourishing since the outbreak of the pandemic are sucking part-time workers out of mom-and-pop shops in South Korea, leaving self-employed businesses readying to return to normalcy under the country’s eased social distance restrictions understaffed.

According to data from Statistics Korea last month, the number of self-employed people and small businesses without employees stood at 4,249,000 this year versus 4,193,000 last year, suggesting that part-time workers are shunning mom-and-pop stores. Over the same period, the number of platform workers, however, tripled from 220,000 to 660,000.

Government second-quarter job data also showed that the number of IT-related service jobs has surged since the pandemic, with the number of wage workers in the information service and computer programming industries rising 9,000 and 8,000, respectively, in February last year to 72,000 and 162,000 in May this year.

This mismatch caused by rapid changes in the labor market is worrisome, experts say. Self-employed people are struggling to find part-time workers to meet the sharply increased demand as the country is getting back to normalcy through a gradual easing of virus restrictions under the living with Covid-19 scheme.

Many part-time workers have left self-employed and small workplaces, mostly involved in face-to-face services, not only due to the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic but also due to the increased hourly wage. This polarization is expected to deepen as low-skilled part-time workers prefer flexible working practices and high paying jobs especially in the platform industry.

According to online job site Albamon, the average hourly wage for part-time workers was 9,865 won ($8.3) as of end-November, which is already higher than this year’s minimum wage of 8,720 won. It is also higher than last year’s average hourly wage of 9,279 won.

Market watchers say the hourly wage will soon exceed 10,000 won as many small businesses are racing for part timers even at premium wages.

By Park Hong-joo, Moon Ga-young and Minu Kim

[ⓒ Pulse by Maeil Business Newspaper & mk.co.kr, All rights reserved]