SEOUL, Nov. 22 (Xinhua) -- South Korea's income gap among households widened in the third quarter on continued earnings fall of the low-income bracket, a government report showed Thursday.
The monthly nominal income among households with at least two family members averaged 4,748,000 won (4,206 U.S. dollars) in the July-September quarter, up 4.6 percent from a year earlier, according to Statistics Korea.
It was the fastest quarterly increase in four and a half years, but an income disparity between the rich and the poor widened further as the low-income bracket's earnings kept falling.
Among the five income brackets, income of the bottom 20 percent declined 7 percent over the year to 1,318,000 won (1,168 U.S. dollars) in the third quarter, after sliding 8 percent in the first quarter and 7.6 percent in the second quarter, respectively.
Income of the top 20 percent, however, expanded 8.8 percent to 9,736,000 won (8,625 U.S. dollars) in the quarter, keeping an upward trend for 11 straight quarters since the first quarter of 2016.
The ratio of income among the top 20 percent to earnings among the bottom 20 percent reached 5.52 in the third quarter, marking the highest third-quarter figure since the relevant data began to be compiled in 2003.
