Jobs for youth project are disregarded by the youth

A job seeker in South Jeolla Province surnamed Lee gave up an application for the public data trainee program of the National Information Society Agency last month. The program, which recruits over 4,800 young people to help with government agencies’ building of public data, provides short-term employment opportunities with 1.83 million won per month for five months. Despite the insignificant payment, the youth are hesitant to apply for the program.

“The program does not offer four major insurances and cannot be used as an intern experience on your resume. It is mostly simple, repetitive work according to a review of a participant last year, which will not help much with looking for jobs later,” said Lee. He is hesitant to apply for even a short-term job to avoid wasting time if it does not help with his experience. The public data trainee program has a shortage of candidates and is looking to hire additional 1,565 workers at the moment.

As the government expands jobs for youth projects with an increased budget, some projects are experiencing a shortage of candidates. One of the reasons behind it is the increase in short-term part-time jobs that cannot be used as job experience and others positions that do not meet the expectations of the youth.

According to the government data on Monday, there are 555,000 jobs created this year to help young people’s employment, 135,000 of which were created by the government’s direct employment – digital jobs for the youth and local government-led jobs for the youth – or with the government’s subsidies to the private sector. Additional 60,000 digital jobs for the youth were added on March 1 with a supplementary budget bill.


Ae-Jin Ju jaj@donga.com