Older workforce threat to Korea?s productivity

Korea’s leading shipbuilding companies, all members of the Korea Shipbuilders’ Association, have an average workforce age of 42 and, since they have for the most part stopped hiring to shrink their payroll costs, it is a move that is now haunting them.

“Right now, the shortage of available workers is more serious than the aging of the work force,” a spokesman with the association said. “If there is no infusion of young blood at some of the shipyards soon, they might have to close down in 10 years or so.”

The average age of all Korean workers could rise to 40 in five years compared to 37.5 years last year, up nearly nine years from the figure in 1980. Wage earners in their 40s accounted for nearly 40% of the work force last year, and only 27.5% of workers were in their 20s.