• Journal of Labour Economics
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• v.29 no.1
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• pp.41-73
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• 2006

Using 1998~2003 data of the Korea Labor and Income Panel Survey, we analyze the scale, characteristics, and dynamic transition of working poors. The result shows that more than half of the poor families are working poors and that a considerable portion of economically active households is in poverty. However, compare to other kinds of poor families, working poors can easily escape from poverty once after they entered into poverty. When household head is elderly and less educated, the risk of working poor is relatively high. Also, self-employed households have high risk of working poor compare to households having wage worker(s). To ease the problem of working poor, creation of decent jobs and human resource development for vulnerable groups are important. Especially, the creation of decent jobs will do critical roles not only in solving employment issues but also in moderating income inequality among families. Policy development for self-employed in the brink of poverty and establishment of a solid social security system for working poors are also recommended.

• Journal of the Korean Regional Science Association
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• v.37 no.1
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• pp.15-27
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• 2021

This study investigates the difference in income trajectories of the working poor and the non-working poor and explains the effects of socio-demographic (marriage, education) and regional (living in large cities) factors on intergroup differences. We use Seoul Survey data collected between 2009-2018 and the latent growth modeling approach. It was found that the trajectory difference between groups was statistically significant. Since 2016, the income gap widened as the income of the working poor stagnated. The three variables included in this model better explained the income trajectory of the working poor compared to the working non-poor. In particular, the change in income growth rate was positively related to whether they live in large cities. This suggests the possibility that living in a large city would act as an economic premium for the working poor. It is necessary to conduct follow-up studies on urban premiums for the working poor.

• 한국사회정책
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• v.25 no.4
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• pp.71-104
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• 2018

This paper adopts a distributive performance process model of in-work poverty based on labor markets, households, and welfare states and analyzes the 4-11 waves of the Korean Welfare Panel Study during 2008-15. Previous studies on in-work poverty have focused on the definitions and concepts of in-work poverty by analyzing employment and unemployment persistence and repetition dynamics, but rarely paid attention to institutional distributive performance. In this regard, this study preforms a stepwise analysis of labor markets, households, and welfare states as a process of income generation in labor markets, satisfaction of welfare needs and income pooling at households, and deduction of social security contribution and income tax as well as receipt of public transfer income at welfare states. Results of empirical analysis show that in-work poverty had been on increase during 2008-11, followed by a decrease between 2012-15. At labor market stages, full time status had the most prominent impact on in-work poverty process, while status by employment and contract type have generated a huge variation as well. At household stages, household work intensity and number of earners contributed to reduction of in-work poverty, but the relations did not seen to be straightforward. However, welfare state played little role in lifting employees out of in-work poverty. In terms of institutional distributive process, in-work poverty was prevalent in either household-welfare state stage or labor market-household-welfare stage. Non-vulnerable group in terms of in-risk poverty was around 80% of the sample during the period of analysis, the size of which has remained constant.

• Korean Journal of Social Welfare
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• v.59 no.3
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• pp.147-174
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• 2007

This study examines how path dependency of working poor labor market segmented from the primary and the secondary labor market affects employment and quality of employment of working poor. It Further examines how path dependency makes working poor to remain in the labor market and makes it difficult for them to escape from a vicious poverty cycle. Data is based on the $3{\sim}7th$ Korea Labor and Income Panel Study(KLIPS). Markov's transition probability and discrete-time hazard analysis are used for analysis. This study finds that Korea labor market is divided into three parts; the primary labor market, the secondary labor market and the working poor labor market. The proportion of employed poor has been reduced, but the proportion of non economically-active working poor has been increased and has become the main group among the working poor. This shows that labor demand of working poor is fundamentally lacking and there are structural barriers that block working poor's employment itself. The regression analysis shows that the longer working poor labor market participation is, the lower poverty-exit rate. This is an evidence of vicious poverty cycle that the poor have little chance to exit from working poor labor market, once they step into it. Therefore, the longer their participation in poor labor market, the more likely they would move only within the closed working poor labor market. Consequently, it is necessary to fundamentally reform labor market structure and to alleviate negative perception and discrimination about the poor labor while activating labor demand.

• Korean Journal of Social Welfare
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• v.67 no.4
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• pp.31-50
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• 2015

This study attempted to empirically investigate the determinants of poverty transition of the working poor with disabilities from a dynamic perspective. Analyses were conducted on the data from Panel Survey of Employment for the Disabled(PSED, Year 1-6), included the households with a disabled head of household. The working poor were defined as the household of which income fell below 120% of the absolute poverty line among the households just described. As results, The 6-year mean poverty rate for the working poor with disabilities included in the analysis was 31.4%, approximately three times of the poverty rate of the total population and the working poor with disabilities were found to have greater difficulty with poverty exit once having fell into poverty than all households living in poverty. And it was found that the economic activity factor was the key determinant of in-work poverty. In addition, employment of the working poor with disabilities did not lead straight to poverty exit, and the quality, rather than the status of, employment was the key determinant of poverty exit. The implications of the findings of this study are that it is essential to increase decent jobs, expand the social safety net of the working poor with disabilities and establish poverty reduction measures for each class of the working poor with disabilities to exit from poverty.

• Korean Journal of Labor Studies
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• v.19 no.1
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• pp.35-64
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• 2013

This paper explores whether or not a minimum wage increase can do much to alleviate working poor. For this purpose, I analyze transitions from working poor to working non-poor and to unemployment or non-economically active states, using KLIPS (Korea Labor and Income Panel Study). This study uses the multilevel multinomial logit model to control unobserved individual heterogenous characteristics. It finds that a minimum wage increase tends to cause a higher probability of transitions from working poor to working non-poor. It is also discovered that a minimum wage increase is not negatively related with the persistence of the working state. It is concluded that minimum wage increases are likely to be effective in improving the living standards of the 'working poor'.

• Korean Journal of Social Welfare
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• v.57 no.2
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• pp.119-142
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• 2005

The purpose of this study is to explore and describe of the reality of working poor in Korea. In spite of the increasing attention to the working poor, usual definitions of the working poor have some measurement questions. The definition of the working poor should focus on the key dimensions of work and poverty. This study defines working poor as all "persons who have devoted prior 6 months to working or looking for work and who lived in families with incomes below the poverty threshold". This study also defines poverty threshold based on the both concept of absolute and relative poverty. According to this definition, the working poor are almost equally divided between men and women and the majority of them are of prime working age. These characteristics of working poor are seems to be quite different from common sense. Also, serious deficiencies of human capital contribute to the employment problems of the working poor. Their education levels are much less than those of the working non-poor. The distributions of the employment status, occupation, and industry show also that the working poor are highly concentrated in a few low-wage jobs.

• Korean Journal of Social Welfare
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• v.59 no.1
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• pp.251-274
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• 2007

Although linkages between poverty and disability are often noted, until recently they have not been systematically examined in Korea. Many people with disabilities tend to become poorer because they lack access to jobs. And income support programs are not sufficient. But more severe is people with disabilities in labor market tend to be poor. The purposes of this study were to explore the characteristics of working poor with disabilities and to identify the major determinants of poverty. For this, '2005 Survey on the Workers With Disabilities' was used. The data was analyzed by descriptive statistics, t-test, logistic regression. The results showed that gender, age, education level, marital status, region where they live, the number of the household member, the severity of disability, the onset of disability are significant predictors in determining their poverty status. Also employment status, occupation type, industry type, numbers of years in current job are major determinants of their poverty status. Finally, based on these results several policy implications were presented.

• Journal of the Korean association of regional geographers
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• v.12 no.6
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• pp.671-692
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• 2006

In recent years, it seems that a considerable stratum of working poor as a new urban poverty among labor population within large cities has been generated, deepening socio-spatial conflicts. This paper is to bring focus on the working poor which can be seen as a newly emerged special problem intermingling labor and poverty. It first begins with a consideration of definitions on the working poor, then discusses on the internal relationship between labor and poverty problems by analyzing causes of the generation of the working poor and looking into actual conditions of working poor from both static and dynamic perspectives, and finally considers existing policies for supporting the working poor, suggesting some alternative policy tasks for resolving the problem of the working poor.

• Korean Journal of Social Welfare
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• v.60 no.4
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• pp.5-29
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• 2008

The purpose of this study is to investigate the effect of job characteristics of working poor on poverty status, focused on sex differences. The results are as follows. First, there are sex differences in career year, job position and industry for determining poverty entry. And second, career year, job regularity and occupy are different variables for men and women in determining poverty exit. This result says that job characteristics partially affects on poverty status of sex differently. Thus we need to sensitive policy that considers different experiences of men and women working poor as to poverty status mobility.