President Lee's Approval Rating Reaches 40% After Seven Weeks

President Lee Jae-myung's approval rating has slightly increased, recovering the 40% mark for the first time in seven weeks, according to a poll released on October 23.

The Korea Gallup survey conducted from October 20 to 22 among 1,001 eligible voters aged 18 and older found that 40% approved of President Lee's job performance. Disapproval stood at 50%, with 10% undecided.

The approval rating rose by 1 percentage point from the previous week, while disapproval decreased by 2 percentage points. The gap between approval and disapproval narrowed from 13 percentage points to 10 percentage points.

Among those who approved, the most cited reason was 'diplomacy' at 21%. This was followed by 'economy and livelihood' at 14%, 'communication' at 7%, and both 'generally doing well' and 'working hard' at 5% each.

Conversely, the primary reason for disapproval was 'real estate policy' at 18%. Other reasons included 'economy and livelihood' at 16%, 'national defense and security' at 10%, and 'generally doing poorly' at 6%.

Korea Gallup noted that real estate issues have consistently ranked as the top reason for disapproval since the fourth week of July, and there has been an increase in mentions of economic issues in both approval and disapproval ratings compared to the previous week.

Among centrist voters, approval was at 40% and disapproval at 47%. Among those without party affiliation, approval was at 21% and disapproval at 54%.

In terms of party support, the Democratic Party of Korea stood at 37%, and the People Power Party at 28%, with both parties gaining 1 percentage point from the previous week. The gap between the two parties was 9 percentage points. The Justice Party received 3%, and the Reform Party received 2%, while the undecided group accounted for 27%.

This survey was conducted by Korea Gallup using randomly selected mobile phone virtual numbers provided by the three major telecommunications companies. The response rate was 10.6%, with a margin of error of ±3.1 percentage points at a 95% confidence level. For more details, refer to the Central Election Survey Deliberation Committee and Korea Gallup's website.