Self-employed workers account for about a quarter of the country’s workforce, the seventh-most among member states of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development(OECD).

According to Statistics Korea and the OECD on Monday, the number of non-wage workers including the self-employed, marked six million-588-thousand as of 2022, accounting for 23-point-five percent of a total workforce of 28 million.

The ratio is the lowest since the compilation of relevant data began in 1963, with the figure peaking at 69-point-three percent in 1964 before falling below 50 percent for the first time in 1984 and dropping below 30 percent in 2009 during the global financial crisis.

The ratio decreased for 24 straight years from 1999 to 2022.

However, the latest figure is still more than three times that of the United States and more than twice that of Japan.

Non-wage workers include the self-employed and unpaid family working at their businesses.