The average annual paycheck at the country's largest 500 local companies rose 2 percent from the previous year to 74 million won ($65,457) in 2016, with petrochemical companies dominating the upper rankings, analysis showed Wednesday.
Corporate tracker CEO Score looked into salaries of 334 of the 500 top firms that submitted financial statements last year. The top payer was Yeochun NCC, a naphtha cracking center company, whose yearly average salary was 119.9 million won. Hanwha total, another petrochemical firm, followed at 115 million won. S-Oil came in sixth with 110.8 million won, and SK Innovation at 11th with 101 million won.
(Yonhap)
In all, six of the 12 companies with over 100 million yearly salary were in the petrochemical sector.
Reinsurer Korean Re (111 million won), Shinhan Financial Group (110 million won), Samsung Electronics (107 million won) and SK Telecom (102 million won) also made it on the list.
The biggest pay raise was at Dayou A-Tech, an auto parts supplier, with 36.8 percent. SK Innovation gave a 32.9 percent salary increase.
Seafood company Dongwon Industries, non-life insurer Hyundai Marine & Fire and Lotte Chemical were among the companies who sweetened their salaries by over 20 percent.
By business sector, securities companies had the highest annual pay, averaging at 89.2 million won. IT and electrics ranked next with 87.9 million won, car components 87.1 million won, and credit financiers 82.8 million won.
The least paying jobs were in distribution (37.4 million won).
The average salary for food and beverage companies was 50.7 million won and 58.1 million won for pharmaceuticals. Services companies averaged at 58.6 million won. (Yonhap)