Korea’s July jobless claims hit $1 bn; insurance funds’ deficit to widen
Jin-kyu Kang
Aug 10, 2020 (Gmt+09:00)
South Korea's jobless claims payments topped 1 trillion won ($842 million) for the third consecutive month in July, threatening to widen the shortfalls of the government’s employment insurance funds to as much as 3.3 trillion won by year’s end.
Jobless benefit payments came in at 1.19 trillion won ($1 billion) in July, marking the biggest amount for a single month, according to the Ministry of Employment and Labor on August 10. The number of recipients hit a record high of 833,000.
In the first seven months to July of the year, a total of 6.7 trillion won were paid in benefits to the unemployed or job seekers, accounting for 70% of the government’s original budget of 9.5 trillion won in allowances for all of 2020.