"No Money"... 1 in 2 Office Workers Gave Up Summer Vacation

Jikjang Gapjil 119 Survey of 1,000 Workers
62% of Vacation Forgoers Say "No Financial Leeway"

A survey revealed that only four out of ten office workers have plans for a summer vacation this year.

On the 23rd, the civic group Workplace Bullying 119 announced the results of a survey conducted by the public opinion research firm Embrain Public. The survey was carried out over a week starting from the 9th of last month, targeting 1,000 office workers aged 19 and older nationwide. According to the results, only 43.9% responded that they have plans for a summer vacation in 2023.

Among the remaining 56.1%, 19.8% said they have no plans for a summer vacation at all, and 36.3% said they have not decided yet.

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Among the 561 respondents who did not make summer vacation plans, the top reason for giving up on a vacation was "lack of financial means to go on vacation," cited by 61.9% (347 people). This was followed by ▲ "concern about increased workload after taking vacation due to busy work" (17.8%) ▲ "no or insufficient paid annual leave" (12.8%) ▲ "feeling pressured by the company if taking vacation" (7.5%).

In particular, it was found that office workers who are non-regular employees, work at small businesses with fewer than five employees, or have lower ranks and salaries had a lower rate of having vacation plans. The gap in the percentage of workers with vacation plans between those working at companies with 300 or more employees (57.1%) and those at companies with fewer than five employees (33.3%) was 23.8 percentage points.

Among office workers who have summer vacation plans, 66% (289 people) said their vacation period is "within 5 days," and only 1 in 10 (10%) said their summer vacation exceeds one week. Also, most office workers were found to take summer vacations using their paid annual leave, with 67.5% responding that they are not guaranteed any separate special summer leave beyond their paid annual leave.

Meanwhile, a survey expanded to include all adults, not just office workers, showed an even lower percentage of respondents with summer vacation plans. According to a survey conducted earlier this month by the online research firm PMi, targeting 3,000 adults nationwide, only 27% said they have summer vacation plans. 36.8% said they have no plans, and 36.2% said they have not decided yet.

Respondents mainly cited "difficulty coordinating schedules" (35.4%) and "financial burden" (34.8%) as reasons for giving up on vacations, with 17.5% also mentioning "work-related reasons."

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