Park to receive 3.4 pct raise

January 5, 2016

SEOUL (Yonhap) — The Cabinet raised President Park Geun-hye’s annual salary by more than 3 percent in a wage hike that also affected all other civic servants across South Korea, officials said Tuesday.

Park is set to earn 212 million won (US$178,000) this year, compared with 205 million won last year, according to officials at the Ministry of Personnel Management.

Prime Minister Hwang Kyo-ahn will be paid 164 million won, up 3.4 percent, while Cabinet ministers are set to earn 120 million won, according to the ministry.

Salaries for conscripted soldiers will go up 15 percent on-year in 2016, with sergeants earning 197,100 won a month, according to the government.

All able-bodied South Korean men must carry out compulsory military service for about two years in a country that faces North Korea across a heavily fortified border.