Korean Job Discussion Forums

cubanlord · Joined: 08 Jul 2005 Location: In Japan!

http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/nation/2010/02/117_60502.html

bassexpander · Joined: 13 Sep 2007 Location: Someplace you'd rather be.

Won't happen, simply for the fact that it would really hurt hagwons AND the money would be subject to leaving the country.

On another note, few F-2's I know of actually do much private teaching. They all make their bread from company jobs and second jobs. An F-2 learns pretty quick that there isn't a lot of money in doing a one-hour private, traveling 1 hour to the next, then finding it's been canceled, etc. One can spend half of their evening traveling for just a few hours teaching.

Smart F-2's go for long blocks of time at another school, for example. Or they have their own business (many of which do so legally).

Changing this law wouldn't make a difference to F-2's. It would hurt E-2's far more.

Captain Marlow · Joined: 23 Apr 2008 Location: darkness

will the hagwon lobbyists let this go through? probably not... why should parents pay a hagwon when they can get one-on-one privates for their children from the comfort of their own home? and if the tutoring prices per hour do go down, that's just more incentive for parents to yank their children out of hagwons and enroll a tutor's help...

just my first thought...

bassexpander · Joined: 13 Sep 2007 Location: Someplace you'd rather be.

Yep. Gov't could care less about the hagwons, but they REALLY care about letting money leave the country. If you think banking laws are tight now... wait until 6 months after such a thing goes through.

tzechuk · Joined: 20 Dec 2004

I really, really doubt the hourly rate would go down even if they legalise private tutoring because everyone knows what the going rate is.

Of course, this is not taking into account demand and supply... but in case you haven't noticed, the demand and supply law doesn't really apply in Korea..

Also, I highly doubt that the government is going to allow foreigners to only do private tutoring - this will become freelance - and no country that-I-know-of allows non-citizens to freelance. How would they issue a work visa? On what justification? Would they create a *freelance* category?

Furthermore, even if you do charge a much lower rate, there are still plenty of people who cannot afford it. Lest we forget, a lot of the times hagwons are used as a babysitting service. You pay 150,000 a month, 5 days a week, an hour a day. That's 7,500 won an hour per day. A private tutor, how ever low, will NOT charge a measly sum of 7,500 an hour.

Competition is healthy, and if it does go through, it may just increase the quality of education... on the other hand, I don't think Koreans know the meaning of quality....

Troglodyte · Joined: 06 Dec 2009

It wouldn't be something extraordinary for them to create a "freelance" visa. There are a lot of countries in Europe that issue young people (i.e. in their 20s) work-travel visas. Depending on the country and bilateral agreements, the visas are anywhere from 3 months to 2 years.

I don't think we'll see that anytime soon in Korea, and I doubt many teachers would go for it. It's so easy for travellers here to pick up a few classes for a couple months in Seoul or Busan and then move on to somewhere else in Asia. For the paperwork necessary to get such a visa I doubt most people would apply.

If immigration let E2s teach freelance on top of their regular work, without additional permission from the employer or immigration, then I think that a lot of people would go for it. How many of them would declare taxes on their additional income is another story. Either way, a lot of illegal teaching happens and the majority of it is by E2s. From the number of travellers that I've met (people just passing through) I doubt they comprise a large percentage of the illegal teaching by NETs. Legalising the freelance work by E2 holders would not decrease the money going out of the country (let face it, we don't represent a large part of the Korea economy anyway). What it would do is allow honest people to pay taxes on their freelance work. I don't think taxes would increase either. They is no real reason for it to do so.

nautilus · Joined: 26 Nov 2005 Location: Je jump, Tu jump, oui jump!

robot · Joined: 07 Mar 2006

SanchoPanza · Joined: 10 Jan 2010 Location: London

bassexpander · Joined: 13 Sep 2007 Location: Someplace you'd rather be.

big_fella1 · Joined: 08 Dec 2005

Pinished · Joined: 08 Dec 2009

Mr. Pink · Joined: 21 Oct 2003 Location: China

The title of this thread is pretty sensational. Has someone been reading too many Korean newspaper articles?

I have to agree with the other F-visa posters: doing exclusively private tutoring is not a secure way to bring in the bank.

Having a decent day job and doing some at night or having two day jobs is what most F-visa people I know do.

Also, the amounts might go down, but for experienced teachers, I think they can demand what they want. Clients can take it or leave it.

BoholDiver · Joined: 03 Oct 2009 Location: Canada

In my experience, the best way to make money (other than opening your own place) is to secure a full time job with short hours and relatively good pay. Then fill in the remaining hours with blocked privates.

pkang0202 · Joined: 09 Mar 2007

Private tutoring isn't the cash cow people think it is. If you have the time, the connections, and the energy then it can be lucrative. The number of Koreans willing to throw down 50,000w an hour for private tutoring is far and few.