The Rise of the Labor Movement and the Development of Internal Labor Market in the Korean Manufacturing Industry

Abstract

The object of this paper was to examine whether the rise of the labor movement brought about the segmentation of the blue collar labor market and the development of the firm internal labor market(FILM) in Korea after 1987. We found that it did. The employment stability of workers in large firms has increased and wage differential by firm size has been enlarged. The male blue collar workers in the large firms prefer to stay in a firm rather than to move among firms. One of the factors that resulted in segmentation is that Korean labor unions are enterprise unions.