The average South Korean salaryman reads 2.3 books and spends 29,000 won ($25) on books every month, a survey showed Friday.

The survey of 935 people conducted by Hunet, an education service institute, on the occasion of UNESCO's World Book Day, which falls on April 23, said 45 percent of those polled read one book and 34.7 percent read 2 to 4 books.

About 8.5 percent said they read 5-7 books, and 2.2 percent said they read more than 10 books every month.

The percentage of people who read nothing reached 8.5 percent.

By sex, the number of books read by males was 2.4 and that for females was 2.0.

In terms of spending, 43.9 percent said they paid 10,000 won to 30,000 won on books every month.

About 16.2 percent said they spent 30,000 won to 50,000 won, 14.8 percent spent less than 10,000 won and 10.7 percent spent 50,000 won to 100,000 won.

About 10.7 percent said they did not spend any money on books.

Most of those surveyed (61.6 percent) said they purchased books at online bookstores, while 24 percent bought books at offline stores.

About 8.9 percent borrowed books from libraries, and 5.5 percent bought e-books.

The average salaryman visited bookstores 1.4 times per month and libraries 0.9 time per month.

Economics and business management (43.2 percent) was the most popular subject, followed by humanities, history, religion and arts (42.4 percent), and poems, novels and essays (12.5 percent). (Yonhap)