While Japan famously brought the world the concept of “death from overwork,” South Koreans work longer hours, according to labor data. SEOUL, South Korea…
While Japan famously brought the world the concept of “death from overwork,” South Koreans work longer hours, according to labor data.
SEOUL, South Korea — Lee Han-bit helped produce a television series called “Drinking Solo,” in which young adults cramming for a high-stakes civil-service exam often drink to relieve anxiety. But working weeks without a break and asking his own employees to work 20-hour days, Lee was consumed by pressures of his own.
He killed himself within days of completing the project, leaving behind a note that decried a South Korean work culture that exploited him and required him to exploit his crew in turn.
“I too was nothing but a laborer,” Lee wrote. But to them, he added, “I was nothing more or less than a manager who squeezed the laborers.”
Lee’s message reverberated across South Korea, a country that has long worked too hard.
While Japan famously brought the world the concept of “death from overwork,” South Koreans work longer hours, according to labor data. In fact, they put in 240 more work hours a year than do Americans — or, put another way, an extra month of eight-hour workdays.
The South Korean police say work pressure plays a role in more than 500 suicides a year, out of a national total of about 14,000.
South Korea’s leaders are trying to change that. A new law that went into effect this month caps workweeks for many employees at 52 hours. The government is pushing companies to let employees go home for the night and to free up their weekends. A call to the Ministry of Labor is greeted with a recorded voice message that says, “Our society is breaking away from overwork.”
The extra time off is especially liberating for young workers, who often don’t share the work-at-all-cost ethos of their parents.
Woo Su-jin, 26, a computer graphics designer, said the media outlet where she works now allows her to arrive later in the morning if she worked late the night before. Project discussions over food and drinks that used to last from 7 p.m. to 1 a.m. now end earlier, after one round of drinks rather than three.
“My colleagues and I say that we would rather go home earlier than work long hours, even if we were paid for working overtime,” Woo said.
