[Photo] Gap between corporations and SMEs getting wider

The gap between South Korea’s conglomerates and small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) continues to widen. According to data released by Statistics Korea on Dec. 10, conglomerates comprised a mere 0.2% of for-profit companies but accounted for 44.7% of all operating profits in 2018. This doesn’t even account for major financial institutions and public enterprises, which accounted for 19.4% of operating profits in the same year. Therefore, SMEs comprised 89.3% of all for-profit companies in 2018, but accounted for only 4.4% of operating profits. (Hankyoreh archives)