If you don’t work for Samsung or SK Group you are lower class.

I mean, that’s just factually incorrect. South Korea has a fairly large manufacturing economy, a lot of my family are shipwrights and make really decent money. The other half of my family works for banks and for the government, none of them are considered low class.

South Korea does have a pretty brutal work regiment, but they also have very aggressive trade unions who aren’t afraid to go on massive and often violent strikes.

old friends who do work for those Chaebols will stop associating with you.

According to who? I mean you may stop seeing them as often, but that’s just because the work culture often extends out of office. It’s pretty traditional to go out drinking or eating with your coworkers, but that doesn’t mean people stop associating with their friends who don’t work with them.