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= Gender Inequality in the workforce in South Korea = As one of the Four Asian Tigers, South Korea has experienced significant economic growth and become a well-developed nation in the past few decades. However, when it comes to gender equality, South Korea ranks near the bottom among  Organization of Economic Co-Operation and Development (OECD) countries according to World Economic Forum. Despite the election of Park Geun-Hye as the first female president of Korea, the issue of gender inequality in South Korea still occurs in many aspects of Korean society, especially in the workforce.

History
This Korean gender inequality issue can refer back to its Confucianist cultural belief and tradition. Confucianism emphasizes men as breadwinners and women as homemakers, and, therefore, Korean women generally have been expected to devote their lives to domestic affairs and childcare. However, Confucianist ideology has become less dominant in Korean society after the Asian financial crisis in 1997. The younger generation now can accept the concept that both the husband and wife should work in order to react to accidents if one was laid off and share the expense for daily necessities. Besides, the Korean government has been working on making some progress in improving women’s rights, such as the "Equal Employment Law" in 1987 and "Ban on Gender Discrimination" in 1999, and these improvements indeed had some positive outcomes demonstrated by an increase in Women’s participation in the labor market. In 2017, the female labor force participation rate reached 50 percent. Nonetheless, overall, Korean women still face problems like female-unfriendly labor environments and limited public services for childcare.

Double Burden Makes Women Less Reliable as Workers
Although many young men prefer to marry career women rather than stay-at-home wives, men still are affected by some Confucianist traditions. Nowadays, Korean women are still expected to be entirely responsible for the housekeeping duties and childcaring while they are working at the same time, which sometimes leads to double burden or even overburden for women with work and house responsibilities. Men often do not help with these “house affairs.” In fact, Korean women face the highest pressure to leave their jobs in and take care of their children once they have a family among other Asian countries. These social and gender expectations create a M-shaped employment curve of women’s participation in the workforce. This iconic M-shaped model reflects the significant influence of life-cycle stages like marriage, child bearing, and child rearing on Korean women’s workforce participation. In many conservative employers’ opinion, this M-shaped model demonstrates the high potential that women workers will leave their positions after marriage and certainly childbirth, which further makes these employers feel reluctant to hire females and see women as unreliable workers. Moreover, women are considered as less committed to their jobs and less reliable as workers by employers because of such roles with the double burden. In many cases during the past few years, such as the 1997 Asian financial crisis and the 2008 global economic crisis, women become the most dispensable employees and often are the first group of workers being laid-off.

Wage Gap
The World Economic Forum ranked South Korea at 115 out of 145 countries in terms of economic participation and opportunity. This data shows that South Korea has the largest gender pay gap in the OECD. Historically, the average working woman earned 42% of what a man made in comparable jobs during the 1970s. Yet, this gap has gradually narrowed. In 2010, women made an estimated 64% of the salary that their men colleague would earn for equivalent work. For women with higher education, the gender gap in wage is slightly narrower but still significant. In 2010, women with a bachelor’s degree or higher earned about 66% of what men with the exact qualification earned.

Occupational Segregation
Although South Korean elected Park Geun-Hye as their first female president, Korean women still continually face discrimination in job opportunities and promotion. The majority of women in the workforce, can only engage in cheap, less-skilled filed as irregular workers. They often struggle to enter the elite fields and occupy few senior positions in business and politics. Many often find it hard to smash the thickest "glass ceiling". In fact, data made by International Labor Organization statistics in 2015 shows that Korea has the highest gender inequalities in the managerial positions among OECD countries

The Korean occupational segregation is significantly severe in the leadership position. According to data presented by McKinsey, female participation on corporate executive board is only 1 percent. Moreover, most female Korean executives are either the children or grandchildren of the founders of their company. The Wall Street Journal reports that only 13 of the 1,787 firms listed on South Korea’s stock market are managed by female CEOs. But, four of those female CEOs are directly related to the companies’ founders. Many argue that the Confucianist traditional gender role values cause this occupational segregation.