"I might miss out on a KRW 600 million bonus"... Parental leave rates fell at both Samsung Electronics and SK hynix

[Financial News] Parental leave rates at Samsung Electronics and SK hynix fell in tandem during the first half of this year. This was the first time the rates had declined simultaneously at both companies, with more employees apparently giving up leave to secure performance bonuses worth hundreds of millions of won.

According to the semiannual and business reports filed with the Data Analysis, Retrieval and Transfer System (DART) on the 27th, Samsung Electronics' parental leave rate in the first half of this year was 35.5% among employees with children born that year. That was 0.7 percentage points lower than the 36.2% recorded during the same period last year. The rate for men fell from 12.4% in the first half of last year to 11.2% this year, while the rate for women declined from 94.3% to 88.2% over the same period.
At SK hynix, the parental leave rate in the first half of this year was 3.2% among employees with children in elementary school or younger, down 0.8 percentage points from 4.0% during the same period last year. The rate for men fell from 1.3% in the first half of last year to 0.7% this year, while the rate for women dropped from 10.1% to 8.9% over the same period. Until then, there had been cases in which the rate declined at one of the two companies, but never at both simultaneously.
The simultaneous decline in parental leave rates at the two semiconductor companies is being attributed in part to employees choosing not to take leave so they would not miss out on record-high performance bonuses.
Samsung Electronics and SK hynix had previously reached labor-management agreements to pay 10% and 10.5%, respectively, of their operating profits as performance bonuses, with no upper limit.
Samsung Electronics' semiconductor business performance has improved sharply since the second half of last year. Its operating profit this year is expected to exceed KRW 350 trillion, while performance bonuses for its semiconductor division are projected to range from at least KRW 200 million to more than KRW 600 million.

As the previously rising parental leave rates began to decline, the shift was interpreted as reflecting employees' expectations of bonuses worth hundreds of millions of won.
SK hynix also shows an inverse relationship between business performance and its parental leave rate.
In 2023, when the company swung to an operating loss of nearly KRW 8 trillion, its parental leave rate exceeded 8% and reached a record high. However, as annual operating profit rebounded sharply to the KRW 23 trillion and KRW 47 trillion ranges in 2024 and 2025, respectively, the rate fell to the 6% range for two consecutive years.
[email protected] Ahn Ga-eul Reporter