Ultra-Short-Hours Workers in Korea

Picture a part-timer who works at a cafe or convenience store on weekend afternoons, exactly two days at 7 hours each, 14 hours in total. Korean law calls a worker whose agreed weekly hours fall short of 15 an ultra-short-hours worker. Whether you work 14 and a half hours or just 5, you stay below this line.

Korean labor law treats 15 hours a week as a kind of big "benefit threshold." Cross it, and you get a solid set of legal protections and paid benefits. Fall short, and you slip past the main safety nets. The logic is that fewer hours means a lower level of protection.

That's why many employers who want to cut labor costs choose to split jobs into under-15-hour shifts. A position that one person could work for 30 hours gets sliced up and handed to two or three people. This is the so-called "slicing part-time job" (jjogaegi alba), and it's why the practice is so widespread.

What changes when you work as an ultra-short-hours worker, compared with a regular employee? The first difference you feel is how your weekly pay is calculated. Workers who put in 15 or more hours a week and complete their scheduled days normally earn the right to a weekly holiday allowance (juhyu sudang). Ultra-short-hours workers, who work under 15 hours, don't get it.

That's not all. Even if you work faithfully at one job for over a year, you don't get legal severance pay when you leave. You also don't get annual leave, the paid vacation that comes from a year of hard work. You are simply paid the hourly wage for the hours you work, on the days you work.

The gap shows up in the "big four" insurances too. Industrial accident insurance, which compensates for accidents at work, always applies. But the national pension, health insurance, and employment insurance are, in principle, not mandatory for these workers.

There is an important exception, though. Employment insurance covers you if you keep working at one place for three months or more, even under 15 hours a week. The national pension and health insurance use "60 hours a month," not a weekly figure, so some work patterns can qualify. Also, starting in January 2027, the employment insurance test changes from working hours to "monthly pay of 800,000 won or more." If you've worked a short schedule for a long time, be sure to check whether you're covered.

To be more precise, ultra-short-hours work isn't always bad for workers. For students juggling classes and a part-time job, or caregivers who can't commit to long hours because of child care, it can be a flexible job that fits their lifestyle. There's also the upside of working a short, focused stretch and spending the rest of your time freely.

In reality, though, many people can't find a stable regular job and end up piecing together several short part-time jobs. Say you shuttle between two convenience stores to make a living and work 14 hours at each, 28 hours in total. Each store counts your hours separately, so you get no weekly holiday allowance or severance pay at all.

Because of this, there is a steady chorus of voices in the labor market saying the 15-hour line doesn't protect vulnerable workers. Instead, they say, it is being used as a tool to create more unstable, sliced-up jobs.