Looking at National Tax Statistics... Seoul Tops Financial Income Last Year, Sejong Leads Earned Income

National Tax Service Releases 2021 National Tax Statistical Yearbook

[Sejong=Asia Economy Reporter Kim Hyun-jung] Based on last year's tax data, the region with the highest average financial income per person was Seoul, while the region with the highest earned income was Sejong. In Seoul, the average financial income per person among those who filed comprehensive income tax returns with financial income exceeding 20 million KRW reached 362 million KRW.

According to the '2021 National Tax Statistics Yearbook' published by the National Tax Service on the 22nd, the number of comprehensive income tax filers last year was 8.021 million, an increase of 425,000 (5.6%) compared to the previous year. The comprehensive income tax base was 208.5 trillion KRW, and the total determined tax amount was 37.4 trillion KRW, which increased by 12.6 trillion KRW (6.4%) and 2.5 trillion KRW (7.2%) respectively from the previous year.

The number of people who filed comprehensive income tax with financial income exceeding 20 million KRW last year was 179,000, a sharp increase of 20,000 (12.6%) compared to the previous year (159,000). The average income per person among those subject to comprehensive taxation on financial income was 278 million KRW, with Seoul having the highest at 362 million KRW. This was followed by Busan at 257 million KRW, Gwangju 255 million KRW, Daegu 251 million KRW, Gyeonggi 219 million KRW, and Incheon 215 million KRW.

On the other hand, the number of workers who filed year-end tax adjustments for earned income tax last year was 19.495 million, an increase of 328,000 (1.7%) from the previous year. The average salary per person among workers who filed year-end tax adjustments was 38.28 million KRW, up 840,000 KRW (2.2%) from the previous year.

By workers' residence, Sejong had the highest average salary at 45.15 million KRW, followed by Seoul (43.8 million KRW), Ulsan (43.37 million KRW), and Gyeonggi (38.85 million KRW).

The number of workers with total salaries exceeding 100 million KRW was 916,000, an increase of 64,000 (7.5%) from the previous year. This surpasses the increase rate of workers earning over 100 million KRW in 2019 (from 802,000 in 2018 to 852,000 in 2019, 6.2%).

The number of workers with no determined tax amount was 7.255 million, accounting for 37.2% of the total. This increased by 200,000 from the previous year, and the proportion relative to all workers rose by 0.4 percentage points from 36.8% last year.

Last year, the number of foreign workers was 545,000, a decrease of 41,000 (7.0%) compared to 2019, while the average salary per person was 29.44 million KRW, up 2.22 million KRW (8.2%) from the previous year. Among these foreign workers, Chinese nationals (198,000) were the largest group, followed by Vietnamese (44,000), Nepalese (32,000), and Cambodians (26,000).

The number of capital gains tax taxable asset transfers for 2020 was 1.455 million, an increase of 463,000 (46.7%) compared to the previous year. By asset type, the increase rates were highest for stocks (93.4%), houses (86.6%), real estate rights (57.4%), other buildings (36.7%), and land (16.1%).

The average transfer price of houses subject to capital gains tax (excluding non-taxable cases such as under the one household one house exemption) for 2020 was 353 million KRW, up 5 million KRW (1.4%) from the previous year (348 million KRW). By location, the average transfer price of houses (353 million KRW) was highest in Seoul (690 million KRW), followed by Sejong (346 million KRW) and Gyeonggi (333 million KRW).

During the same period, the number of people subject to comprehensive real estate tax was 744,000, a 25.7% increase (152,000) from the previous year (592,000). The determined tax amount was 3.9 trillion KRW, a sharp increase of 900 billion KRW (30.0%) compared to the previous year.

The number of people subject to the housing portion of the comprehensive real estate tax was 665,000, rising by 148,000 (28.6%) in just one year. By region, Seoul (391,000) and Gyeonggi (147,000) accounted for 80.9% of the total determined taxpayers (665,000).

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.