Economists warn the narrow growth will leave sectors including construction, retail, services and small businesses struggling to keep pace
4-MIN READ4-MINPark Chan-kyongPublished: 8:00am, 23 Jun 2026South Korea’s AI-driven semiconductor boom has sent exports, corporate profits and stock prices to record highs, but a senior policymaker has warned that the windfall could fuel property speculation and deepen inequality if its gains remain narrowly concentrated.“Looking solely at the numbers, it is something to cheer about. However, strangely, a corner of my heart feels heavy,” Kim Yong-beom, chief of the Presidential Policy Office and one of South Korea’s most senior economic policymakers, said in a social media post on Saturday.
Headline indicators continued to improve, he said, with South Korea’s year-on-year nominal GDP growth rate expected to surpass double digits this year after reaching 17.1 per cent in the first quarter, the highest level since 2002.
But the presidential policy chief warned that the boom could prove short-lived if its benefits remained concentrated among a small segment of society, noting that many local shopping districts struggled with closed storefronts and rising business failures.
Economists said his unease reflected a broader concern about how narrowly the boom was being felt, with sectors including retail, services and small businesses struggling to keep pace.
At the centre of the surge are Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix, two of the world’s most important suppliers of memory chips used in artificial intelligence systems.
