00:00There's a new member of South Korea's A-list.
00:03Chip factory staffers are suddenly enjoying hot demand, and not just at work.
00:09They've also become a very desirable commodity in the country's competitive marriage market.
00:15The change comes as the global AI boom sees salaries soar at top tech firms.
00:21Some workers at Samsung's chip division are set for bonuses of about $416,000.
00:27That's around 14 times South Korea's average annual salary.
00:32There are big payments too at arch-rival SK Hynix.
00:36Now all that has chip workers rivaling doctors and lawyers as the nation's most desirable partners.
00:44Lee Sung-mi is a consultant at matchmaking agency Sunwoo.
00:48She says tech staffers now rate very highly.
00:52Scores for Samsung Electronics employees have recently risen from 83 to 87.
00:58As for clients who work at SK Hynix, their scores are expected to climb from around 80 to 83,
01:05showing just how highly favored the company has become.
01:09The big payouts are also reshaping South Korea's job market.
01:13There too, the medical and legal professions had long ranked at the top.
01:18Now career advisers and students both say there's hot competition to get into the tech firms.
01:24Ambitious young people are even looking to vocational schools, since some chip jobs only need a high school diploma.
01:32Park Joon-young is a career consultant for university students.
01:38Semiconductors are arguably the only industry that can truly ride the AI boom.
01:42They've taken center stage, and the result is outsized salaries and bonuses.
01:48So much so that, in effect, it's created a different tier.
01:53At Korea University, a semiconductor engineering course has seen admission scores hit historic highs.
02:00And it's drawing students who might once have aimed for medical school.
02:05Freshman Ku Bon-ho is one.
02:09I chose a semiconductor engineering major because I figured campus life would be a bit easier than in medical school.
02:22The internships wouldn't be as long, and since I wanted to get a job quickly and enter the workforce.
02:31With chips accounting for around 40 percent of the country's exports,
02:34some say it's time the tech workers got their due.
02:38Right now, staffers at Samsung and SK Hynix are certainly reaping the financial and romantic rewards of the AI boom.
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