hankyoreh

June 13.

Union membership rates in 2008 fell 0.3 percentage points to 10.5 percent from 10.8 percent recorded in 2007. It means that only one out of ten laborers belong to a union.

On Wednesday, the Ministry of Labor said, “According to the results of the research about union membership rates conducted by the Korea Labor Institute (KLI), 1.66 million laborers out of a total of 16.18 million laborers in South Korea belong to a union.” The Ministry added, “Union membership has decreased by 22 thousand compared to membership in 2007.”

Union membership rates recorded a high of 19.8 percent in 1989, two years after the June 10 Democratic Uprising. Since then, however, there has been a continuous decline. KLI’s study shows that between 1997 and 2001 union membership rates fell 12 percent to 13 percent, and in 2002 and 2003, the rates fell 11 percent and 12 percent respectively. Since 2004, the rates have fallen 10 percent to 11 percent.

The study also shows that union membership rates among workers employed in the private sector fell to 8.8 percent in 2008 from 9.2 percent in 2007. Union membership rates among teachers fell to 21.5 percent in 2008 from 24.3 percent in 2007.

The exception to this pattern is in union membership rates among civil servants. The rate has risen to 75.3 percent in 2008 from 67.1 percent in 2007.

The progressive Korean Confederation of Trade Unions (KCTU) and the conservative Federation of Korean Trade Unions (FKTU), the nation’s two largest umbrella labor organizations, show different patterns in union membership rates. The FKTU has had a continuous decrease over the years in its membership rates, while the KCTU’s rates have remained stagnant. Meanwhile, unions outside of these two umbrella organizations have shown a continual increase in union members, and show a 6.6 percent increase from 2007 and 282 thousand members in 2008. In 2000, union members outside of these two federations numbered at only 40 thousand in 2000, and 93 thousand in 2005.

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