Seven out of 10 foreigners working in Korea were paid less than 2 million won ($1,800) a month this year, Statistics Korea revealed Thursday.

According to the state-funded agency, about 525,000 foreign workers were paid less than 2 million won in 2013. They took up 71.4 percent of the total 735,000 salaried non-Korean employees.

Of them, the monthly wage for 42,000 workers was below 1 million won, accounting for more than 5 percent of all foreign workers.

About 159,000 non-Koreans were paid between 2 million won and 3 million won, while the number of individuals whose wage exceeds 3 million won came to 51,000.

By gender, 84.6 percent of the 241,000 female foreign employees were paid less than 2 million won.

The statistics authorities said the total number of non-Korean workers, in both salaried and self-employed jobs, came to some 760,000 as of May 2013. The jobless rate in the same period stood at 4.2 percent of the 1.12 million foreigners older than 15.

The non-Korean employment rate dropped to 67.5 percent in May, down 3.5 percentage points from a year earlier.

About 377,000 non-Koreans, nearly half of all those employed, were hired by the manufacturing industry, according to the data.

It also showed that 138,000 foreigners were either self-employed or employed in the private and public service sectors, followed by retail, lodging and restaurants with 137,000 and the construction sector with 64,000.

More than 470,000 foreign residents were regular workers, while 263,000 non-Koreans here had nonregular jobs.

By nationality, Korean-Chinese topped the employment roster with 331,000 workers, followed by Vietnamese with 76,000, Chinese with 55,000, North Americans with 47,000 and Indonesians with 29,000.

The combined 386,000 Korean-Chinese and Chinese workers accounted for more than half of all salaried and self-employed foreign workers.

Data showed that the number of workers from Europe and North America (Canada and the United States) increased by 2,000 and 1,000, respectively, compared with the previous year.

In contrast, the number of Korean-Chinese, Vietnamese and Mongolian workers fell by 26,000, 6,000 and 3,000, respectively.

“Total employment declined due mainly to en masse expiry of the visa held by Korean-Chinese and Chinese workers,” said a Statistics Korea official.

But he downplayed the fall and predicted a large portion will return to work. He cited the law which obliges Chinese employees who applied for visa renewal to stay in China for at least three months.

By Kim Yon-se (kys@heraldcorp.com)