President Lee Jae Myung speaks by phone with U.S. President Donald Trump at the presidential office Cheong Wa Dae in Seoul, Sunday. Courtesy of Cheong Wa Dae

President Lee Jae Myung's approval rating climbed back above 60 percent for the first time in three weeks, driven by positive assessment of his livelihood-related policies and a strong stock rally, a poll showed Monday.

According to the survey, commissioned by EKN newspaper and conducted by Realmeter on 2,506 respondents aged 18 and older from Monday through Friday, the positive assessment of Lee's job performance gained 0.8 percentage point from a week earlier to 60.5 percent.

Negative assessment fell 0.6 percentage point to 35.1 percent over the cited period, while 4.4 percent said they were unsure.

Realmeter said the president's efforts on livelihood-related issues, including the benchmark Korea Composite Stock Price Index surpassing the 8,000 mark, and his visit to the southeastern regions of Daegu and North Gyeongsang Province to inspect the site for a planned civilian-military airport, helped drive up his approval rating.

The pollster said a set of negative factors partly offset the positive sentiment, including the controversy surrounding remarks by presidential policy chief Kim Yong-beom on profit sharing of tech companies, as well as concerns over a possible strike at Samsung Electronics following the breakdown of wage negotiations.

On Tuesday, Kim floated the idea of introducing "public dividends" funded by excess tax revenues generated from the semiconductor boom driven by artificial intelligence (AI), prompting a strong backlash from the opposition block and reportedly causing the benchmark stock index to plunge.

The survey had a margin of error of plus or minus 2 percent at a 95 percent confidence level.

In a separate survey conducted by the same pollster, support for the ruling Democratic Party fell 2.9 percentage points from a week earlier to 45.8 percent, while support for the main opposition People Power Party rose 2.6 percentage points to 33.5 percent.

The poll, conducted on 1,003 individuals aged 18 and over on Thursday and Friday, had a margin of error of plus or minus 3.1 percentage points, with a confidence level of 95 percent.

Source: Korea Times News