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Korean Job Discussion Forums
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Real Reality
Joined: 10 Jan 2003
Location: Seoul
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Been There, Taught That
Joined: 10 Apr 2007
Location: Mungyeong: not a village, not yet a metroplex.
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 Posted: Mon May 19, 2008 2:55 am Post subject: |
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| Been There, Taught That wrote: |
| wylies99 wrote: |
| Huh? Do you think we're overpaid? |
Not at all. Overworked,maybe, which is the danger in being salaried. But specialists are right up there with independent businesspeople: set your own compensation level and keep moving on until you get it or find a happy medium. That's the beauty of the ESL teaching system in Korea. |
Then again, yes, comparably, when it comes to quality levels that English 'teachers' bring with them from wherever they abandon to get to Korea; when it comes to the willingness to better oneself and grow with the profession, or even to consider it a profession; when it comes to the inability of some dissatisfied teachers to get up and get out of Korea and find something else they might be suited to, then, low wages or high mindedness, some 'instructors' in Korea are definitely overpaid. |
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aka Dave
Joined: 02 May 2008
Location: Down by the river
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| Posted: Mon May 19, 2008 6:13 am Post subject: |
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[quote="Been There, Taught That"]
| itaewonguy wrote: |
| Ilsanman wrote: |
And wages are doing what?
President Lee will have a busy year. |
Native Korean and non-native English teacher salaries are apples and oranges.
Native English speakers are to countries which need them like lawyers, doctors and other specialists are: except that English is a naturally acquired skill, with no student loans to pay back on it.
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Are you saying Native English speakers are like lawyers, doctors (i.e., well paid professional).
If so, please, put down the sojo.
Let's get to brass tacks. The first year I taught in a *crappy* American high school I was paid 45,000 dollars a year (I was paid well because i have a lot of grad school, 5 years: but still, that's as a high school teacher).
As a professor at a Korean University (yeah, they call me gyo su nim), I get paid 25 million won a year, which is roughly 24,000 dollars.
NEARLY HALF AS MUCH as a high school teacher in the states.
And doctors, jeebus. My sister has 2 little kids and is a *part time* pediatrician. She clears 150k part time.
I don't spend a lot of money here in Korea. But comparing native teachers to doctors and lawyers is off the charts stupid. |
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Been There, Taught That
Joined: 10 Apr 2007
Location: Mungyeong: not a village, not yet a metroplex.
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| Posted: Mon May 19, 2008 1:41 pm Post subject: |
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[quote="aka Dave"][quote="Been There, Taught That"]
| itaewonguy wrote: |
| Ilsanman wrote: |
And wages are doing what?
President Lee will have a busy year. |
Native Korean and non-native English teacher salaries are apples and oranges.
Native English speakers are to countries which need them like lawyers, doctors and other specialists are: except that English is a naturally acquired skill, with no student loans to pay back on it.
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| Quote: |
| Are you saying Native English speakers are like lawyers, doctors (i.e., well paid professional). |
Here's the context:
| Quote: |
Native Korean and non-native English teacher salaries are apples and oranges.
All natives living and working in their own countries have to compete with every other average job seeker like themselves, within their education level (or lower, for you lucky humanities degree holders). Foreigners in Korea, however, are brought in to specialize, to "do the job no natives want [to admit they are not able] to do. So, the specialty is a perceived need and one better-compensated, on the whole, than the general working ability of the average Kim on the street. Native English speakers are to countries which need them like lawyers, doctors and other specialists are: except that English is a naturally acquired skill, with no student loans to pay back on it.
All in all, I still believe in the power of the native English speaker to do magic just by agreeing to come to Korea in the first place. |
Context helps. People often read for it.
| Quote: |
| So, the specialty is a perceived need and one better-compensated, on the whole, than the general working ability of the average Kim on the street. |
Professional is more than what you get paid. It's a mark of the way you earn payment. Normally, it's even the way we justify getting paid what we do. However, We all know that many English teachers readily prove themselves to be less than 'professional' caliber. It just shows through.
The point is that when you need medical or legal or English help, there's a place you naturally know to go. Those people who can provide help are, so to speak, character actors. It's what they are seen as. Nothing to do with money.[quote]
| Quote: |
| Quote: |
| Huh? Do you think we're overpaid? |
Not at all. Overworked, maybe, which is the danger in being salaried. But specialists are right up there with independent businesspeople: set your own compensation level and keep moving on until you get it or find a happy medium. That's the beauty of the ESL teaching system in Korea.
Then again, yes, comparably, when it comes to quality levels that English 'teachers' bring with them from wherever they abandon to get to Korea; when it comes to the willingness to better oneself and grow with the profession, or even to consider it a profession; when it comes to the inability of some dissatisfied teachers to get up and get out of Korea and find something else they might be suited to, then, low wages or high mindedness, some 'instructors' in Korea are definitely overpaid. |
It has to do with where you go to get what you need. Nationals can do anything, specialized or not, usually not. Can foreign English teachers? |
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Real Reality
Joined: 10 Jan 2003
Location: Seoul
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| Posted: Tue May 20, 2008 2:46 am Post subject: |
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Starbucks, Millers, Green Fees Higher Here Than Elsewhere
By Oh Young-jin, Korea Times (May 20, 2008)
http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/biz/2008/05/123_24481.html
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... consumers in Korea pay about 55 percent more for cosmetics than consumers of the compared countries; 46 percent more for snacks (in this case, Pringles was sampled); and about 37 percent more for original books (in this case, JK Rowling's Harry Potter books).
If the Korean price is taken as 100, Britons would pay 68 percent of what Koreans pay for Starbucks coffee, while Japanese would pay 57 percent.
In comparison with other Asian developing competitors such as China, Singapore and Taiwan on the basis of the current exchange rate, Korea is pricier on average for five out of seven items.... Also under the same standard, prices in Korea are higher than those in the United States for six out of seven products sampled. |
http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/upload/news/080520_p01_starbucks.jpg |
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Real Reality
Joined: 10 Jan 2003
Location: Seoul
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| Posted: Tue May 20, 2008 5:59 am Post subject: |
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Way Too Expensive
Korea Times (May 20, 2008)
http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/opinon/2008/05/202_24494.html
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There is no dearth of surveys and statistics backing it up. A Swiss institution puts Korea's competitiveness as measured by its living cost index at the bottom of 55 countries surveyed. Goods and service prices and housing expenses in Seoul were 20 to 40 percent higher than New York and other global cities. This combined with low levels of openness to foreign culture, poor labor-management relationships and technological regulations to pull down Korea's ranking in terms of foreign direct investment to GDP to 54th place.
Foreigners of course are not the only ones suffering from high prices. According to the Korea Consumer Agency, the prices of seven goods and services, ranging from fruit juice to green fees, were 1.5 to 2.3 times higher even than the average of G-7 countries.
If these selected items appear to have less to do with working-class people, one should refer to the gradual fall of Korea's per capita gross national income to 51st place among 209 nations in 2006, a level that hardly deserves the label of a semi-developed country, let alone an advanced one.
In short, high price levels erode national competitiveness and reduce real income, deteriorating the overall standard of living. |
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Real Reality
Joined: 10 Jan 2003
Location: Seoul
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icicle
Joined: 09 Feb 2007
Location: Gyeonggi do Korea
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| Posted: Tue May 20, 2008 2:56 pm Post subject: |
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| SirFink wrote: |
| mistermasan wrote: |
| aren't white rice and flour similar in that neither provides any nutritional value. |
They're both very good at providing type 2 diabetes and obesity. But if you're poor, what else are you gonna eat? US beef?  |
BUT it is also true that combined with a traditional Korean diet they do not have the same effect as they have in a Western Diet ... I have Type 2 diabetes and my control over Blood Glucose levels has improved significantly since I have come back here and eaten primarily traditional healthy Korean food including a large amount each day of rice ... which did suprise me ... But I have since read research about the impact of some aspects of the Korean diet on lowering blood glucose levels ... So it is actually not possible to look at one aspect of the Korean diet in isolation. While white rice may have a relatively high GI ... the actual GI of the meal does depend on what is eaten with or combined with the rice |
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Grab the Chickens Levi
Joined: 29 Apr 2008
Location: Ilsan
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| Posted: Tue May 20, 2008 3:55 pm Post subject: |
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| itaewonguy wrote: |
| Ilsanman wrote: |
And wages are doing what?
President Lee will have a busy year. |
nothing.. as ESL teachers are paid low always have been..
the average korean with a degree is paid 2.3-2.6 starting base..
and that increases every year! you stay at a company for 5 years you tap out at 5 million a month!! the ESL *beep* stays at a hakwon for 5 years will get maybe an extra 200-300K a month..
and foreigners keep saying how the pay is good here hahahaha |
Yeah prices have gone up. I'm still saving around 900 pounds or $1800 a month though with my ps job and only 6 hrs a week pt work in the evenings. Would still save 600 - 700 pounds a month even with only my ft job and that wouldn't mean living in low style in any way either.
So I'm not sweating it. Can the hysteria folks, the bed is still rosy. |
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jim_we
Joined: 06 May 2004
Location: Korea
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| Posted: Tue May 20, 2008 7:20 pm Post subject: |
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I've been buying gold and silver for about 2 years. I have a nice stash put away, and will buy as long as I can (before staying in Korea doesn't pay). I've mostly been buying the 99.99% "butter pat" guem don (gold money) from a local mom and pop jewelery store. It converts very nicely to kruggerrands when I go home and exchange it. I figure by 2010-11, gold will easily be in the 4 digits and silver will be way above $20/oz.
A nice stash of gold does a gold bug's heart good! |
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Cheonmunka
Joined: 04 Jun 2004
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| Posted: Wed May 21, 2008 2:16 am Post subject: |
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This is a really cool thread.
How much actual natural flour is in Ramyon anyway???
If you read the back of the ramyon the first ingredient is some kind of oil. The second is potato paste, the third, a flour. And most of the entire mix comes from the States.
The FTA will add parity to some of the things going on with that.
It's all a big rip-off I reckon.
In NZ cheese that used to be 8.99 has gone up to $17. A jump of say an additional 60%. (I'm no mathematician.) Fuel has gone from 1.30L to 2.00. So again another high jump of about 35%? However, I buy Australian imported cheese at EMart that has gone about 15% up in the last year, and fuel as we know it in K has gone up about 20%. Western firms are pricing the way they want. I'd much rather be here ...
Korea's protectionism, and our country firms' needs to have international markets, may be better for us than how we would fair in the west.
What I can't understand is the central cash rate and the exchange dropping you know, costing us more. The interest rates here are actually okay, going up about 6% for deposits. Not high but secure enough.
It shouldn't be dropping against the US. Is there some kind of recession going on in Korea? I've never seen so many newly bought BMWs.
I don't get it. Any MBAs wanna chip in about that? |
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ryouga013
Joined: 14 Sep 2007
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| Posted: Wed May 21, 2008 7:17 am Post subject: |
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I have noticed that the price of a few things have been going up but not too much... yet... I have noticed the confectionery such as chocolate had actually been on sale at much cheaper prices than normal, and other things have stayed about the same.
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Something missing from this figure is the beef prices... as they are said to be the highest in the world...
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captain kirk
Joined: 29 Jan 2003
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| Posted: Wed May 21, 2008 7:43 am Post subject: |
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| jim_we wrote: |
I've mostly been buying the 99.99% "butter pat" guem don (gold money) from a local mom and pop jewelery store. It converts very nicely to kruggerrands when I go home and exchange it.
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How much gold do you carry on the plane home then? How much is allowed? |
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Unposter
Joined: 04 Jun 2006
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| Posted: Wed May 21, 2008 2:39 pm Post subject: |
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You have to be careful about what is meant by Korean salaries. The statistics may or may not include bonuses and other incentives; they may only be base salaries.
So, the guy who is earning 2 mill a month starting at Daewoo may not be adding in his bonuses; probably not as he may not even know what his bonuses are. In good years, which obviously this may not, even low level employees can see their salaries double because of bonuses.
He may also have other fringe benefits. He may have free meals, transportation allowances, and education credits as part of his salary. Now, I know that he has a "real" job and we all have "pretend" jobs and all but if you are going to add in our housing, airfare and end of the year bonus, you have to add in his too!
Most middle class Koreans I know in the Seoul area make at least 3 mill a month, many much more (maybe they are not middle class). Yes, they do work longer hours and if you are willing to work a second job or illegally, then you too could make as much as they do but DCJames has one point: We have to work extra to make what the average Korean makes.
Prices are going up around the world because of increased oil prices and it should be of no surprise we find it here. The question is are prices going up accurately reflect additional costs or are they going up so that a few people can profit over other people's misery. I don't know the answer to that question but it does seem the Korean media is insinuating that prices gouging may infact be the case. For example, I heard the price of a Starbucks coffe is 1.7 times higher than in Japan! Of course, that is a foreign product and Starbucks has been a target for ultra-nationalists for some time. Still, why should the product be almost double what it is in Japan???
As English teachers, we should be concerned about fair wages and working conditions. And, we should be allowed to earn what the market will bear for our services. The people who talk down our wages by saying we are undeserving are just plain foolish. Why don't you just give your money to Korean charities and leave the rest of us out of it. Certainly, we don't provide the kind of service that doctors provide (they save lives) but it would not be absurd to say that we provide a service similar to lawyers who have specialized knowledge and skills set. Now, maybe you pull things out of your behind and sell them as gold nuggets and there are certainly sheister (sp?) lawyers who do the same but there are plenty of people who do provide important assistance in this country and you should not talk down the whole profession just because you see one tiny piece of it.
Use your knowledge wisely is my advice. This includes about wages, prices, market, and learning the (ESL) or a (other) profession.
IMO, Korea is full of con men. Be careful out there! |
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cheeriocookie
Joined: 06 May 2008
Location: Busan
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| Posted: Wed May 21, 2008 5:07 pm Post subject: |
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| This is scary news. Let's hope that the trend reverses. |
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