Eight out of 10 people employed here work more than the legal limit of 40 hours per week, a survey showed Wednesday
According to the survey of 587 workers, 81 percent, or 475 respondents said they work more than 40 hours per week. The survey was conducted by the Federation of Korean Trade Unions, one of the country's major umbrella labor unions, last month.
In 2004, the government implemented a policy to cap the weekly working limit to eight hours per day and 40 hours per week from the previous 44 hours as part of its efforts to improve labor conditions.
Despite the policy change, a government report published last September showed that the country's average weekly working hours ranked the highest among the member states of the rich nations' club -- the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development -- at 44.6 hours per week.
In response, President Park Geun-hye's transition team said in January that it is mulling over shortening working hours by stretching the weekly limit across all seven days of the week, not five.
"We plan to review ways to include weekends and holidays in calculating overtime work in order to change the practice of working long hours," a transition committee official said. (Yonhap)
