Two Semiconductor Makers' Role in Korean Economy Growing
The Korea Economic Research Institute announced on May 24 that the 30 biggest business groups’ 184 listed subsidiaries posted sales per employee of 993.82 million won and an operating profit per employee of 62.35 million won last year. The figures rose 1.2 percent and 16 percent from a year ago, respectively.
The figures drop to 909.88 million won and 39.05 million won, down 0.64 percent and 6.13 percent, when Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix are excluded from the calculation. The 30 groups do not include financial groups and the subsidiaries do not include those in the financial sector.
“Those companies’ sales added up to 838.5 trillion won last year, the sales increased at an annual average of 2 percent in the period of 2016 to 2020, their operating profits totaled 52.6 trillion won in 2020, and the profit increased at an annual average of 0.1 percent in that period,” the institute explained, adding, “Meanwhile, the number of their employees increased at an annual average of 1.1 percent from 809,000 to 844,000 and their labor cost increased at an annual average of 3.5 percent from 59.1 trillion won to 67.7 trillion won.”
“The sale per employee, the operating profit per employee, and the labor cost per employee increased at an annual average of 1 percent, decreased at the same pace, and showed an average annual increase of 2.4 percent, respectively,” it went on to say, continuing, “With Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix excluded, their sales, operating profit, labor cost and number of employees edged up 0.7 percent, dropped 6.4 percent, rose 2.6 percent and rose 0.4 percent on annual average, respectively.”