going to south korea with associate degree? - Page 3

No, they accept the US BS/MS/Ph'D because nobody studies once they get into a Korean university; it is a hard-to-get-in/easy-to-get-out system, and which school you got into proves your worth, not how well you did in school. Students do study hard in US universities or they don't graduate and this is why they accept US bachelor degrees.

Universities programs are usually held to some standard that is used worldwide, in engineering the standard is set by ABET (Accreditation Board for Engineering and Technology).

In being accredited there is some understanding that the students are getting a rigorous education that is at least above a certain level and involving understanding a core set of classes. Beyond that there are other accreditation boards for individual fields, and the standards get more rigorous the higher the level of education, but they are somewhat comparable across countries.