"90% of construction office workers "work six days or more a week"", 23 July 2026

Nine out of 10 construction office workers work six days or more per week. This was largely attributable to inadequate construction schedules.

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The Construction Enterprise Trade Union held a press briefing at Francisco Education Centre in Jung-gu, Seoul, on the afternoon of 22 July, announcing the results of a survey on holiday guarantees at construction sites. Of 1,036 respondents, 774 (89.5%) said they worked beyond five days a week, such as by coming in every other Saturday. A further 53 respondents (6.1%) said they work a fixed six-day week, and 20 (2.3%) said they work more than six days a week. Only 18 respondents (2.1%), the smallest share, said they work just five days a week.

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Overtime was also frequent. Of the respondents, 529 (51.4%) said their contracted hours were generally observed but overtime occurred intermittently, 266 (25.8%) said they constantly exceeded their contracted hours, and 87 (8.4%) said their contracted hours existed on paper only. As many as 420 respondents (39.1%) said they received no additional compensation for overtime worked, owing to comprehensive wage systems and similar arrangements.

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The union explained, "Respondents viewed the obstacles to establishing a five-day working week not as a matter of individual willingness or inadequate site management, but as problems with the industry system itself, such as unrealistic scheduling and the structure of construction costs."