Nearly 3,300 workers in South Korea earned more than 119 million won ($82,000) per month last year, according to government data released Friday.
A total of 3,271 employees paid the highest possible monthly health insurance premium in 2024, according to data from the National Health Insurance Service, obtained by Rep. Kim Sun-min of the National Assembly’s Health and Welfare Committee.
In South Korea, employees pay health insurance premiums based on their salaries and employers and employees split the cost equally.
Unlike taxes, health insurance premiums do not keep rising as salaries increase. Instead, there is a set limit on how much someone can be charged.
Each year, the NHIS adjusts this limit based on wage growth, capping it at 30 times the average workplace insurance premium from two years earlier.
In 2024, the highest possible monthly premium was set at 8,481,420 won. That translates to a salary of about 119.62 million won per month, or 1.43 billion won per year. This means high-income employees earning at least this amount paid a share of 4,240,710 won per month, or about 50.88 million won per year in health insurance contributions.
According to the NHIS, most of these top earners aren’t regular employees but company owners, corporate executives or chaebol heads who make tens or even hundreds of billions of won annually. They represent a tiny fraction — just 0.00016 percent — of South Korea’s 19.88 million workplace insurance subscribers.
For 2025, the maximum monthly premium has increased to 9,008,340 won, which corresponds to a monthly salary of around 127 million won. As a result, employees earning at least this amount pay a maximum monthly health insurance contribution of 4,504,170 won a month.
ssh@heraldcorp.com
