The Very Time of New Year`s Day, “Frozen Wallet of Ordinary People”

Although the biggest holiday of our people is right around the corner, the actual economy situation is still at the bottom. Ordinary people are not opening their wallets because of the economic slump and contraction of consumption mentality, so the merchants are, of course, wearing tearful faces.

▽Plastic bags are the actual index=The sale of plastic bag, which is one of the economical indexes of the market, is decreasing in a large way. Mr. Park, Sang-Yong (63. Yongdungpo-Gu, Seoul), who is operating a factory making packing plastic bags for markets and supermarkets, said, “The production has been reduced by 40% since November. The production, which was 50,000 sheets a month, is only 30,000 sheets a month. Especially, the old fashioned markets seem to have more difficult times.” Mr. Park even fired employees and is operating the factory with his family of 3.

The consumption of home use waste bags also has been drastically dropped. The change of eating habits to reduce wastes might be one factor; however, it is been analyzed that basically, consumption itself has been reduced.

The Manager Mr. Kim (40) of the B company that does waste collection and waste bags wholesale business in Dobong-Gu, Seoul said, “We can feel the economical situation by looking at the sale of waste bags and amount of waste collection. We call it ‘waste economy.’” He said, “In winter of 2001, there were 19t of wastes out of one building, but it was dropped to 15t in last December, and the sale of waste bags also dropped from 45 million won a month in average to 41 million won.”

“Usually, around this time a year, many wholesalers, if not retail customers, came. I couldn’t sleep to do business before, but now I cannot go to sleep because there is no business. I am worried.”

It was Mr. Kim, Hyuk-Sang (48. Won Children`s Clothing) who operates children`s clothing store in the Namdaemoon Market for 14 years.

Mr. Lee (34), who sells casual clothing at the third floor of the Milliore in Dongdaemoon, Seoul said, “The economical slump is really serious,” and “the sale, which used to be around 2 million won a day in this time of year, is reduced to 800,000 ~ 900,000, so the merchants are worrying whether ‘to continue business’ whenever they gather together.”

▽Fastening the waste belt=The office workers, who has thin wallets, are looking for ‘1,000 won lunch.’ A private instructor Ms. Lee (29. Sangey-Dong, Nowon-Gu, Seoul) said, “My income is not stable, so I’m having 1,000 won Gimbob(rice rolled in dried lavers) for lunch.”

The sales of 990 won hamburgers and 700 won triangle Gimbob are growing rapidly.

According to the LG Distribution, the sale of triangle Gimbob in last December at 28 convenient stores in Yeoido and Teheran Road in Seoul, where office buildings are massed the most, was 138 a day in average. It is 10% more than last month`s that of 123.

The use of cellular phone, which was the symbol of ‘excessive consumption’ is facing a cold wave, too. Mr. Jung, Jung-Il (26) of a cellular phone dealer near the Shilim Station of the 2nd Subway Line in Seoul said, “Around 30% of the new customers choose billing plans under 10,000 won a month. Not a few customers are choosing cheap ‘receiving only’ services.”

According to one cellular phone service company, the subscribers to the 6,500 won base billing plan, which started the service in last August, were 687,919 in four month, so it took 14.3% of the total customers.

▽The economical index also shows a red light=The Bank of Korea recently predicted, due to contraction of the economical situation, the demand of fund for this year`s New Year`s Day would be reduced by 29% from last year`s demand of 4.2 trillion won, so it would be only 3 ~ 3.5 trillion won.

The consumer expected index announced by the National Statistical Office this month is 94.8. If this index is lower than 100, it means many people predict the economical situation will become bad in 6 months.

The head researcher of the economical trend division of the Samsung Economy Research Institute, Kim, Bum-Sik (41) said, “It is worried that the consumption is reduced so much that it will have bad effects on object-economy.”

Jin-Suk Huh jameshuh@donga.com