A female worker operates a loading machine at a warehouse in a 2023 award-winning photo released by the Ministry of Employment and Labor. Courtesy of Ministry of Employment and Labor

The number of employed women in Korea has surpassed 10 million for the first time, data showed Monday.

Data released by Statistics Korea shows a growing presence of women in the labor market, despite the ongoing gender discrimination and bias against them in Korean society.

According to the data, an average of 10.15 million women were employed, either long-term or short-term, each month from January to August.

This figure is the highest recorded since the statistics agency began compiling data on female employment in 1963.

"It is the first time that the number exceeded the 10-million mark," the agency said, adding that the figure is likely to remain at over 10 million for the rest of 2024.

The pace of growth in the number of working women increased in line with the jump in female economic participation, rising from 574,000 in 1963 to 1.14 million in 1973, 2.42 million in 1983, 4.51 million in 1993, 5.98 million in 2003, 7.88 million in 2013 and 9.97 million in 2023.

Correspondingly, the number of employed women grew 17.7 times from 1963 to 2023, while that of men grew 6.6 times.

The 10.15 million figure is significant as it has contributed to women achieving a record-breaking share of the paid job market.

Women accounted for 46.1 percent of the 22.02 million paid workers.

Of the 10.15 million, 68.6 percent were employed full-time under contracts lasting a year or longer. Another 28.6 percent worked temporarily for more than a month but less than a year, while the remaining 2.8 percent had contracts lasting less than a month.

Meanwhile, women's economic participation has also risen among self-employed individuals, the agency said.

Approximately 1.72 million women worked independently as business owners or freelancers from January to August, accounting for 30.5 percent of all self-employed individuals during that period.

The agency said the rate also exceeded the 30 percent mark for the first time.

Despite advancements in women's economic participation, Korea still has significant progress to make in addressing the gender wage gap.

Korea ranks at the bottom of the OECD in terms of gender wage imbalance, with the pay gap between men and women at 31.2 percent in 2022. This means that, on average, women earn 68.8 percent of what men make.

Korea was the only OECD member country with a gender wage gap exceeding 30 percent, and this rate was 2.7 times higher than the OECD average.