hankyoreh

As of last year, South Koreans had an average of 3.5 hours of leisure time on weekdays and 5.4 hours on holidays, amounting to a weekly average of 28.3 hours. Office workers took an average of 9.9 days off each year, surveys found.

The results of three studies published by South Korea’s Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism (MCST) and the Korea Culture and Tourism Institute on Feb. 5 found that average leisure time last year, both on weekdays and holidays, had increased by 40 minutes from 2016. The three surveys covered public cultural and artistic activities, public leisure activities, and workers’ vacations.

The percentage of leisure time that was spent “by oneself” (54.3%) has been gradually decreasing, while the percentage spent “with family members” (35.5%) has been on the rise. Watching television (71.4%) continued to account for a large portion of leisure time.

“The overall increase in leisure time seems to be connected with the shorter work hours resulting from the introduction of the 52-hour work week,” an MCST spokesperson said.

Workers took 1.4 more vacation days than they had in 2017. This change was even more noticeable at small and medium-sized enterprises (those with between 10 and 99 employees), where workers took 10.5 days off, an increase of 1.9 days.

Workers used 72.5% of their available vacation days, 13.3 points higher than in 2017. These surveys found that workers spent their vacation by relaxing (33.7%), traveling (32.1%), and doing work around the house (18.6%).

Last year, 81.8% of South Koreans attended a cultural or artistic event. The average number of events attended was 6.3, representing a steady increase from 5.3 in 2016 and 5.6 in 2018. Among households with a monthly income of 1 million won (US$845.77) or below, 51.7% percent attended such events, the first time this figure has exceeded 50%.

When responses are sorted by city size, the percentage of residents of smaller cities attending these events was 71.4%, which was 12.7 points below residents of big cities (84.1%). But the gap between the two has narrowed since 2016, when it was at 15.5 points.

As of 2019, the surveys about public cultural and artistic activities and public leisure activities are being held every year, instead of every two years. This was the second survey to focus on workers’ vacations, following a previous survey in 2017.

By Noh Hyung-seok, staff reporter

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