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Yoon, 34, is not unemployed in the usual sense. He is not sending out resumes, sitting for interviews or preparing for another company exam. Officially, he belongs to a Korean labor market category known as “resting” — people who are neither working nor looking for a job. An engineering major from a university in Seoul, Yoon had once hoped to join a large company in the automotive or semiconductor industry. In Korea, such jobs often mean positions at major corporations, including affiliates of family-controlled conglomerates known as chaebol, and are widely seen as offering higher pay and greater stability. To improve his chances, Yoon retook the college entrance exam after completing his mandatory military service, believing that a stronger educational pedigree would help him compete. But the offers he received came only from small and medium-sized firms. He eventually started working at 30, reluctantly, but each look at his monthly wages left him discouraged. “I decided to quit my job and prepare again for large companies because I thought that was the only realistic way to ea