Older workers overtake young employees at top companies

New hiring fell 15.3% from 2023, with young recruits taking a smaller share

Older workers now make up a larger share of employees at South Korea’s biggest companies than those aged 30 or younger, as new hiring has fallen sharply over the past two years, a report showed Tuesday.

A total of 92,680 employees were newly hired by 132 of the country’s top 500 companies by revenue in 2025, down 15.3 percent from 109,456 in 2023, according to Leaders Index, a local corporate tracker.

The number of employees at the companies edged up from 1.259 million in 2023 to 1.262 million in 2025. However, the share of employees aged 30 or younger fell from 21.2 percent, or 267,343 people, to 18.3 percent, or 230,434, over the same period.

By contrast, employees aged 50 or older accounted for 18.4 percent of the workforce in 2025, or 231,848 people, surpassing the number of employees aged 30 or younger. Their share was up from 17.5 percent, or 221,333 people, in 2023.

The shift was also visible among new hires.

Employees aged 30 or younger accounted for 51.1 percent of new hires in 2025, down from 56.4 percent in 2023. Meanwhile, those aged 50 or older made up 11.2 percent of new hires, up from 8.3 percent two years earlier.

Major Korean companies have traditionally recruited large groups of college graduates for regular, open-ended positions, while some employees return to work on fixed-term contracts after reaching retirement age.

Government data also points to a growing number of older people remaining in the workforce. The number of workers aged 65 or older increased by 333,000 in July, according to data released last week by the Ministry of Data and Statistics.

The ministry said last year that the number of nonregular workers aged 60 or older had reached a record 3.04 million.

By industry, distribution had the highest share of employees aged 50 or older at 41.8 percent, according to Leaders Index.

The food and beverage industry followed at 30.6 percent, with construction and building materials at 29.7 percent and telecommunications at 25.6 percent.

The gap was particularly pronounced in telecommunications, where employees aged 30 or younger accounted for just 6.6 percent of the workforce.