Korean Job Discussion Forums

[Whistleblower]

More English teachers required for Korea. Good luck with placing teachers with an earning of between 1.5 to 2.5 million KRW.

[Gimpokid]

It says they will start accepting people from anyplace where English is the official language.

1.5 is probally excellent money for someone from Jamaica or Belize.

Not sure if Koreans really want their kids sounding like Rastafarians though.

[Horangi Munshin]

Funny. Last night I was looking for Dr. Seuss videos online. I came across a "Learn Jamaican Patois" with Dr. Seuss' ABC

[Scotticus]

Jesus, 1.5 a month. With the current exchange rate that's 1000 bucks a month... yeesh.

[Seoul'n'Corea]

[Easter Clark]

[I_Am_The_Kiwi]

so is that like $1,500US - $2,500US?

[Yu_Bum_suk]

LOVE your avatar, Whistleblower!

Yeah, I can't see too many Americans feeling passionate about making $1,000 / month.

[bundangbabo]

[Adventurer]

[sojourner1]

Wow, this appears to the be the big change in Korea's ESL job market due to globalization. (open it up to more nationalities while decreasing salary) With 1.5m being very decent pay for Philippinos and Indians, they'll jump on this opportunity by the thousands, because that's white collar employee pay in their home countries. With having the apartment provided and living very frugally, they'll send home 1 to 1.2 m Won per month. Of course, these new teachers will seek out all the free food(and happy to eat an all Korean diet) and rides they can get, because those people are very thrifty to save money for sending home even much more so than we typically are, because they can do without luxories and non essential expensive foreign foods. This is common in the USA with people from poor under developed countries coming to work as we've been getting a lot of them for years and it puts a strain on our domestic job market for US citizens. Of course rice, Asian things, and veggies are cheap in the USA. Globalization of the domestic job markets keeps wages low and competition high for jobs while money pours out of the country by the boat loads. Of course, the Korea ESL market is a tiny speck of sand compared to America's foreign worker pool though the Mexicans are in the process of going back home now that work is becoming too scarce, according to an MSN article.

It appears pay is going to go down with increasing competition, because if they are offering this 1.5 to 2.5 to FT's from any country officially speaking English, then that includes us who are currently allowed to teach in Korea. The only reason why this job has been so easy to get is that Korea's protectionist laws benefited us in severly limiting who can come teach, thus, making pay high relative to the level of pay globally for this job. Now that the job market will be opened up to almost anyone fluent in English and attracting real teachers with real credentials who will be happy to passionately teach their butt off for 1.5m per month, it's going to get tough for us to compete or want to stay on account of decreasing pay and decreasing won value.

If you are still sitting in your parents basement in Anytown, USA or Canada considering getting one these jobs in Korea to travel and save money, then jump on it now, because it may not be so doable in 1 or 2 years from now. If the EPIK jobs go this route, then hagwons will also follow suit as this means paying much less and maximizing their profits. Also, it's probably easier to play over an employee from a 3rd world country than it is a Westerner like us since we tend to stand up with initiative for what we know or believe we're entitled to. American employers have been having a world cup of a time with em' for many years.

Do we see a clear cut transition of who Korea's foreign teachers are to be in the coming years?

[sarbonn]

That's truly sad. At least I got in while I could experience this field before it falls apart. I mean, I don't know it will fall apart, but the horizon isn't looking very promising with ads like that.

[bundangbabo]

[Adventurer]

[Easter Clark]

My view is that there will always be people who will be willing to pay for *quality* instructors (a.k.a. "Native teachers"). There are already several NNts in hagwons but people aren't going to stop flocking to NTs because of this.