Share of Companies Paying Chuseok Bonuses Falls to 61%

61.0% of companies said they would pay Chuseok bonuses to employees this year, down 2.0 percentage points from last year's 63.0%. The findings show that a growing number of firms are cutting back on holiday spending. Regardless of the number of days off, companies' willingness to pay Chuseok bonuses — a gauge of employees' real holiday economic sentiment — declined from the previous year. By company size, the downtrend was seen across both large corporations and SMEs. The share of companies with 300 or more employees paying bonuses fell to 66.7% from 68.1% a year earlier, while SMEs with fewer than 300 employees saw a steeper decline to 60.3% from 62.3%.

According to the '2026 Chuseok Holiday Survey' released by the Korea Enterprises Federation, 76.5% of companies said they would close for all four days of the Chuseok holiday, the largest share.

An analysis by the KEF of raw data from the Ministry of Employment and Labor's Business Labor Force Survey found that the average monthly total wage per regular worker in the first half of this year, excluding overtime pay, was 4.318 million won ($3,100), up 3.1% (131,000 won) from the same period last year. Growth in fixed monthly base pay slowed to 2.2%, while special allowances such as performance-based bonuses tied to business results rose from 8.1% to 9.3%, averaging 601,000 won per month.

The rise in special allowances was driven by the electronics and telecommunications industry, which is enjoying a semiconductor boom. Average monthly total wages in the sector jumped 23.1% to 9.434 million won, with special allowances surging 66.0%. Although the industry accounts for only 2.5% of all workers, with roughly 377,000 employees, its increase in special allowances represented 32.4% of the total nationwide increase. Excluding the electronics and telecommunications industry, average monthly total wages in other sectors stood at 4.187 million won, with growth limited to 2.2%.

The gap between company sizes also widened. Wage growth came in at 4.8% for workplaces with 300 or more employees and 2.1% for those with fewer than 300, both down from the first half of last year. However, special allowance growth at workplaces with 300 or more employees rose from 12.8% to 14.7%, with average monthly special allowances reaching a record high of 1.824 million won.