In a recent study entitled "Doing Business 2006" by the World Bank´s International Finance Corporation, Korea ranked 105^th out of 155 countries in labor flexibility.  In contrast, Hong Kong was ranked 3^rd, Singapore 7^th, Japan 20^th, and Thailand was ranked 23^rd for labor flexibility.  The strength of Korea´s labor unions has given companies in Korea very little flexibility when it comes to hiring or firing workers as needed.  According to this study, hiring a worker costs about 17% of the worker´s salary, while firing a worker costs an average of 90 weeks of the worker´s wages.  It costs about 5% of salary to hire a worker in Hong Kong and 8.5% in the U.S., and it costs about 12.9 weeks´ wages to fire a worker in Hong Kong, and 0 weeks´ wages in the U.S.

Korea also rates a 45 on the rigidity of employment index (maximum = 100).  In comparison, Hong Kong received a rating of 0 on the rigidity of employment index, while the U.S. rating is 3.

Despite being the 11^th largest economy in the world, Korea is still not a hospitable place for starting a business, for which it was ranked 97^th out of 155.  The Korean government heavily regulates private sector businesses, requiring 12 procedures (on average) that must be undertaken in order to start a business, with each procedure requiring an average of 22 days.  In Hong Kong, there are only 5 procedures, each requiring 11 days.

In other rankings, Korea came in 27^th of 155 for overall ease of doing business, below a number of other Asian countries, including Singapore (2^nd), Hong Kong (7^th), Japan (10^th), Thailand (20^th), and Malaysia (21^st).