AI: Assistant or rival? Two-thirds of Koreans weigh career change

Two in three working Korean adults have considered or actively pursued a job change in the past year due to advances in AI technology, a new survey shows.

The findings come from a survey of 1,000 employed adults aged 20 and older conducted nationwide by NowNSurvey, the online polling platform of Elim Net, on workplace attitudes toward careers in South Korea.

Some 67.1 percent of respondents said they had considered changing careers because of AI. Among that group, 11.1 percent said they had already begun preparing for or completed a job change.

Despite those concerns, optimism about the impact of AI and other emerging technologies prevailed, with many respondents expecting AI to make their work easier.

The survey's net positivity score — calculated by subtracting the share of negative responses (rated 1 or 2) from positive ones — stood at plus 34.3 percentage points overall, with positive sentiment far outpacing negative. The gap held across genders: men recorded plus 39.8 percentage points and women plus 24.7 percentage points, both firmly in positive territory.

"Overall, the data suggest people tend to view AI as an opportunity rather than a threat," NowNSurvey researchers said.

When asked what gives their job the most meaning, 70.3 percent of respondents cited financial stability and livelihood — by far the top answer — followed by self-actualization at 8.3 percent, life satisfaction at 8.2 percent and social status at 5.5 percent.

Large majorities agreed that their job affects their life satisfaction (87.4 percent) and shapes their identity (84.6 percent), but fewer — 58.2 percent — said their job aligns well with their personal values.

When choosing a new job, respondents ranked salary and welfare benefits first by a wide margin at 47.2 percent, followed by work-life balance at 19.1 percent.

Asked what should change first to improve job satisfaction, 30.9 percent said fair compensation and expanded incentives, while 27.0 percent cited stronger work-life balance — together accounting for 58 percent of responses. The results confirm that the criteria people use to choose jobs and the improvements they want from their current ones converge on the same two priorities. Women showed a notably stronger preference for work-life balance than men.

The survey was conducted from Aug. 14 to Aug. 26 and carries a margin of error of plus or minus 3.1 percentage points at a 95 percent confidence level.