How Artificial Intelligence Is Reshaping the Korean-to-English Translation Job Market: A Qualitative Document Analysis

Abstract

Advances in neural machine translation and large language models (LLMs) are changing how Korean-to-English (KO–EN) translation work is organised, priced, and valued. This qualitative study asks how artificial intelligence (AI) is reshaping the KO–EN translation job market. Using a document-based design, eleven Korea-focused and industry documents published between 2016 and 2026 (news reports, interviews, an industry market report, and scholarly and technical studies) were analysed through reflexive thematic analysis and interpreted against translation-studies and labour-economics scholarship. Six themes emerged: automation of routine text, post-editing as the dominant workflow, polarisation toward high-stakes expertise, contested authorship in literary translation, precarity and pricing pressure, and adaptive role redefinition. Official statistics show that the number of registered translation firms and workers in Korea grew between 2020 and 2023, yet average firm size fell, a pattern consistent with fragmentation rather than contraction. The findings suggest that AI is displacing tasks more than occupations, and that its effects are distributed unevenly across market tiers. Implications for translator training, procurement, and freelancer protection are discussed, together with directions for primary interview research.

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© The Author(s). Published by Multidisciplinary Journal For Advance Research under the CC BY 4.0 licence, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.