1. In an online community of more than 1.8 million small business owners, a user in Jeonju, North Jeolla Province, wrote on Friday: “Am I the only one whose business is falling apart?”
2. “The restaurant near my shop went out of business and has since been replaced by a rental space, and the walnut pastry store next to it also shut down,” the user continued. “This feels serious and unsettling.”
3. The post was soon flooded with sympathetic replies, including: “Business is so dead I can’t even think straight” and “I opened my chicken shop at 4 p.m. and only made 120,000 ($87) won by 8 p.m.”
4. These accounts from small business owners offer a vivid snapshot of the hardships many are enduring — struggles that are reflected in the data.
