What comes out of a Korean daily wage?
This calculator helps daily workers in Korean construction, logistics and events, and employers preparing their payroll, review income-tax withholding and social-insurance deductions.
It uses South Korean rules for 2026, verified on October 4, 2026; amounts are in KRW and are unrelated to another country’s payroll system.
Multiplying a daily wage by workdays gives gross wages, while take-home pay also depends on tax classification, actual payment groups, insurance membership and the agency’s premium bases.
Use the result to review your records
Collect your work record, payroll statement, bank payment record and official premium notice.
Save or print the review and ask payroll about a specific deduction’s period and basis.
A difference is an amount to investigate, not an established refund, and the monthly scenario does not forecast an actual deposit date.
Daily pay and daily-worker tax status are different
General daily-worker income
Income Tax Decree Article 20 requires more than calling someone a daily worker.
General workers continuously employed by the same employer under an employment agreement for 3 months or more fall outside the ordinary daily-worker tax category.
Fixed monthly pay should not receive the daily deduction merely because the contract uses a daily-worker label.
Construction and job exceptions
Construction has a one-year continuous-employment boundary, along with exceptions for roles normally employed continuously, including supervision, technical or office duties, catering, security and construction-machine operation or maintenance.
Port loading work has separate conditions and is outside this page’s general/construction choice.
The employment-insurance definition of a daily worker is also separate from the tax definition.
An unconfirmed classification, 3+ general continuous months or 12+ construction months withholds tax and net results here.
A withheld result is not zero tax.
The 3.3% business-income withholding treatment is another category; verify the substance of the work and tax reporting before deciding which calculator to use.
Inputs and the records behind them
Wage, days and hours
Enter the taxable daily wage, excluding only items whose non-taxable treatment has been verified on payroll.
Workdays must refer to the same workplace and work month; do not count overlapping records twice.
Hours exclude breaks and accept decimals.
Days with different wages or hours need separate reviews because this model assumes uniform daily pay and working hours.
Duration, age and scope
Use 0 continuous months for less than one month.
Recurring contracts and site changes require factual review rather than automatically resetting the period.
The tool covers ordinary workers aged 18 or older.
Uncheck standard insurance scope for foreign-worker, public-service, small unincorporated agriculture or other coverage exceptions; the agency must confirm those cases.
Work month determines the insurance reference and work-report date; actual payment month determines the income-statement date.
For September work paid in October, enter the months separately.
The tool supports one work month and one payment month within 2026; cross-year payment, arrears across multiple months and multiple employers need a separate review.
Income tax: KRW 150,000, 6% and a 55% credit
Start with each workday
Calculated daily tax = max(0, daily wage − KRW 150,000) × 6%
After credit = calculated tax × (1 − 55%)
Equivalent = max(0, daily wage − KRW 150,000) × 2.7%
Income Tax Act Article 47(2) provides the daily earned-income deduction, Article 129(1)(4) the 6% withholding rate, and Article 59(3) the 55% credit.
The 2.7% applies to the amount above the deduction, not to the entire daily wage.
A taxable daily wage at or below KRW 150,000 produces zero tax under this formula, while insurance deductions can still arise independently.
Do not subtract social-insurance premiums from the daily wage before applying this formula.
Daily-worker withholding differs from a regular employee’s monthly simplified tax table and a freelancer’s business-income withholding.
Final taxation of qualifying daily-worker income does not remove any separate filing obligation caused by other income.
The small-tax exemption follows each actual payment
Income Tax Act Article 86 exempts withholding below KRW 1,000.
When multiple daily wages are paid together, add their unrounded daily tax amounts for that payment before assessing the exemption.
Do not exempt each small daily amount before adding it to a multi-day payment.
The model then truncates each payment’s income tax below KRW 10 and calculates local income tax at 10% of that income tax, also truncating below KRW 10.
Check actual payroll rounding and monthly reporting aggregation against the statement.
KRW 187,000 for five days
The daily assessment is KRW 37,000 × 2.7% = KRW 999.
Five separate actual daily payments each qualify for zero income and local tax.
One five-day payment has a pre-rounding assessment of KRW 4,995, followed by income tax of KRW 4,990 and local tax of KRW 490.
The tax difference is KRW 5,480; insurance is assessed separately.
Remainders and exact boundaries
Six workdays grouped into five-day payments create a five-day group and a final one-day group assessed independently.
At a daily wage of KRW 187,037 the daily assessment is KRW 999.999, below the exemption boundary; KRW 187,038 produces KRW 1,000.026 and income tax of KRW 1,000.
Rounding before checking the boundary would change the result.
Weekly grouping refers to actual workdays paid together, not automatically assigned calendar weeks.
The comparison explains differences under the same wage and insurance scenario.
If the employer actually made one monthly payment, entering separate daily payments does not reproduce the withholding facts.
Use actual payment dates, amounts and groups.
Eight days, 60 hours and KRW 2.2 million
Ordinary Korean daily-worker insurance conditions and employee rates| Insurance | Ordinary membership conditions | Employee rate |
|---|
| General daily-worker pension | Under 60; one continuous month; 8 days OR 60 hours OR KRW 2,200,000 | 4.75% |
| Construction daily-worker pension | Under 60; one continuous month; 8 days OR KRW 2,200,000 | 4.75% |
| Health and long-term care | One continuous month AND 8 days; no 60-hour substitute | 3.595% + care |
| Employment unemployment premium | Daily-worker hours exception; distinguish new hire after 65 | 0.9% |
| Industrial accident | Employer cost, no employee deduction | 0% |
National Pension Decree Article 2 provides alternative day, hour and income thresholds for general daily work.
Construction and designated workplaces use days or income, without the 60-hour alternative.
Seven days at nine hours gives 63 hours: it can satisfy the general pension threshold, while construction still needs the day or income condition.
NHIS daily-worker guidance uses one continuous month and eight days; the separate part-time-worker hours rule is not substituted here.
Since July 2025, work across sites of the same construction employer can require combined pension assessment.
This single-workplace model withholds pension and net results when other construction sites are selected.
Voluntary continued pension insurance at age 60+ is not automatically deducted.
Employment insurance distinguishes new employment after age 65 from uninterrupted insured status maintained from before 65; employer employment-stability premiums must not be passed to the employee.
Premium bases and the 2026 limits
National pension monthly income
The 2026 employee and employer rates are each 4.75%, under National Pension Act Article 88 and Act 20903 Supplement Article 4.
January–June limits are KRW 400,000–6,370,000; July–December limits are KRW 410,000–6,590,000.
The confirmed monthly base is truncated below KRW 1,000 before applying the selected month’s limits and premium rounding.
An input of 0 means a gross-wage scenario, not zero premium; an official notice is a better basis than assumed gross wages.
Health and long-term care
The total health rate is 7.19%, with an employee share of 3.595%.
The 2026 total remuneration-based premium limits are KRW 20,160–9,183,480, shared equally; employee limits are KRW 10,080–4,591,740.
Long-term care uses health premium × 0.009448 ÷ 0.0719, corresponding to approximately 13.14% of health premium.
The 0.9448% rate is income-relative and must not be multiplied directly by the health premium.
Employer employment-stability rates are 0.25% below 150 employees; 0.45% for priority enterprises with 150+; 0.65% for non-priority enterprises with 150–999; and 0.85% for non-priority enterprises with 1,000+ or public bodies.
These are separate from the employee’s 0.9% unemployment premium.
Main-contractor rates and size-transition relief need notice-based confirmation.
This tool does not estimate an industrial-accident industry rate or complete employer labor cost.
Worked example: KRW 200,000 for ten days
Assume age 40, general daily work, one continuous month, 10 days × 8 hours in October 2026, and both premium bases set to gross wages of KRW 2,000,000.
The following uses ten actual daily payments with below-KRW-10 truncation for each payment.
Monthly deductions and net pay for ten daily KRW 200,000 payments| Item | Monthly KRW |
|---|
| Gross wages | 2,000,000 |
| Income tax | 13,500 |
| Local income tax | 1,300 |
| National pension | 95,000 |
| Health | 71,900 |
| Long-term care | 9,440 |
| Employment | 18,000 |
| Total deductions | 209,140 |
| Estimated net | 1,790,860 |
Daily income tax is KRW 1,350; daily local tax is KRW 135 before truncation, then KRW 130.
Ten daily payments produce local tax of KRW 1,300; two five-day payments produce KRW 1,340; one monthly payment produces KRW 1,350.
The corresponding five-day-group net is KRW 1,790,820 and monthly-payment net is KRW 1,790,810.
These differences arise from payment-level rounding, not changed insurance membership.
Seven days at eight hours and KRW 200,000 gives 56 hours and KRW 1,400,000, below the ordinary pension and health thresholds despite meeting the duration condition.
Step-by-step review and filing preparation
- Verify the agreement and job classification; replace all sample wages, days, hours, duration and age with actual records.
- Check how many workdays each actual payment covers, including the final remainder; do not merge different wages or months.
- Enter official pension and health bases and compare membership conditions, acquisition dates and full-month premium timing with the notice.
- Compare actual deductions for the same work, excluding advances, meal charges and other non-tax deductions; save the review for payroll.
- Record the work report reference as the 15th of the month after work, and the income statement reference as the last day of the month after payment; check holiday extensions on official portals.
Income Tax Decree Article 213(4) links a work-details report submitted under Employment Insurance Decree Article 7(1) with deemed submission of a daily-income statement.
Verify the classification, submitted contents and missing records rather than assuming every obligation is complete.
December’s following month is January 2027; work and payment reference dates follow their respective input months.
TXT saving and printing create a personal review and do not submit anything to an agency.
Practical scenarios and limits
Later-life work and family payroll help
A worker taking logistics or event jobs after retirement can review the age-60 pension and age-65 employment rules separately.
Family members checking a statement should obtain membership dates and official bases as well as daily pay and workdays.
A small employer can compare seven and eight actual workdays to budget deductions; actual days and income must still be reported accurately.
Cases requiring notice reconciliation
First or last months, retroactive membership, Duru Nuri subsidies, prior-period adjustments and voluntary continued pension can differ from the scenario.
The model does not prorate monthly premiums by workdays.
Weekly-holiday, overtime, night or holiday pay, severance, construction retirement mutual aid, multi-employer aggregation and non-taxable eligibility are outside scope.
Unknown deductions remain withheld rather than being silently treated as zero.
Frequently asked questions
Does KRW 150,000 daily mean no deductions?
Income tax under the daily formula is zero, while insurance depends on separate membership and premium-base conditions.
Is KRW 187,000 always free of withholding?
Its KRW 999 daily tax qualifies only when the actual payment assessment stays below KRW 1,000; a multi-day payment can require withholding.
Does seven workdays exclude every insurance?
General pension also considers 60 hours or KRW 2.2 million; daily-worker employment coverage has an hours exception.
Can 60 hours replace eight days for health insurance?
No: this daily-worker model uses one continuous month and eight days, without importing the separate part-time-worker condition.
Why distinguish age 60 and age 65?
They belong to different pension and employment-insurance rules; uninterrupted insured status from before age 65 also matters.
Does a zero pension-base input mean zero premium?
No: zero selects a gross-monthly-wage scenario, with membership and limits still applied; use the official base when available.
Can I claim every excess deduction as a refund?
No: payment groups, membership timing, bases, subsidies, adjustments and rounding must be reconciled before asking payroll or the agency about a correction.
Does saving the TXT submit a report?
No: it creates a personal review, and official reports still require separate submission and receipt verification.
Official evidence, effective dates and updates
Verified 2026-10-04: Income Tax Act MST280405 (2026-07-01) and Decree MST290841 (2026-10-01); National Pension Act MST280269 (2026-06-17) and Decree MST272577 (2026-01-01); Health Act MST276651 (2026-01-02) and Decree MST289701 (2026-10-01); Long-Term Care Decree MST286011 (2026-05-12).
Employment Act MST284449 was checked in its 2026-09-18 effective-date text, with Decree MST288717 and Premium Collection Decree MST280527 (2025-12-23).
Future employment provisions can be returned with a current-law identifier, so their article dates must be checked separately.
Local Tax Act Article 103-13 (MST282559), Treasury Funds Management Act Article 47 (MST276079) and the 2026 health-limit notice provide the local-rate, rounding and limit context.
Recheck tax rules, insurance rates and health limits each January, and pension income limits each July.
Employment-insurance changes scheduled for 2027–2028 need a fresh effective-date review; they are not mixed into this 2026 model.
Actual official notices and applicable law take precedence when agency guidance changes.
Review the statement one deduction at a time
Enter your actual daily wage and payment groups above, then check membership thresholds and the official premium bases.
Use separate calculators when reviewing regular monthly wages, business-income withholding or construction retirement mutual aid.