Fellow Koreans, Honorable Speaker Chung Sye-kyun and distinguished members of the National Assembly,

During the 19th National Assembly, I stood right here to deliver a speech as a party chairman. Now it is my first time to speak before the 20th National Assembly, but I can feel a sense of close fellowship because I worked with many of you during the last National Assembly session. 

On May 10, I solemnly took the presidential oath of office at the National Assembly. I stand here today to explain the reasons why the Government has drawn up the supplementary budget and present its key details, asking for your understanding and cooperation. 

I heard it is the earliest address in history at the National Assembly by a president and the first-ever speech on the government’s supplementary budget plan. I hope you will accept it as my effort to better communicate and work together with the National Assembly. I hope, however, that you pay close attention to how desperately and urgently the supplementary budget is needed.

I heard about one young adult. He studied hard and entered a university. Later on, he worked way harder to get a job than to get university admission. Unlike our expectations, he says, “For God’s sake, I wish I could be given a chance to have a job interview once.” He is not the only one. There is a countless number of our sons and daughters who now say with calm acceptance that submitting a hundred resumes is the minimum. 

A young out-of-work man who was anxious about his credit card debt wrote the following in his last text message to his parents: “I will be an excellent student in the next life.” I believe the news report on this may have equally touched your heart and made you all feel sad.

Having a job does not necessarily mean being happy. Injured firefighters cannot even take sick leave because they understand too well and feel sorry that their absence would be more of an imposition on their fellow firefighters when they are already short-staffed. A few days ago, we heard the sad news about a mailman who went to work at dawn and died from overexertion.

There is no end of examples like this I could relate. Such a hard life goes on day after day. Nobody can deny that our politics is responsible for it. I want to remind you that what the Government and the National Assembly should do for the people is to face up to this indisputable reality and cope with it properly. 

Fellow Koreans and distinguished members of the National Assembly,

The root cause of hard lives is the shortage of decent jobs. As everyone knows, the current employment situation is very serious, indeed. For this reason, during the last presidential election campaign, we all shared a common understanding that, though there were some differences in approaches, creating many decent jobs was the most urgent task for the economy. 

If I cite a jobs report recently released by Statistics Korea, the unemployment rate is the highest since 2000, and the number of jobless people reaches a record high. Importantly, youth unemployment is so grievous that the situation is described as an “employment cliff.”

The annual youth unemployment rate soared over the past four years since 2013, posting 11.2 percent as of last April, which was the highest since record keeping started. The perceived unemployment rate over the recent three months stayed at around 24 percent, meaning that one out of every four young people are jobless. That is because the children of baby boomers, also called echo boomers, have become the primary working age population while the number of decent jobs wanted by young people has decreased.

Unless we urgently come up with extraordinary measures to address this problem, youth unemployment will increase to the level of a national disaster as long as echo boomers continue to join the primary working age population. A generation of young adults will become a so-called “lost generation.” No matter how much budget we put into measures against the trend of a low birth rate and an aging population, it will be difficult to reap effective results just as we have experienced thus far. 

The uneven distribution of wealth is getting worse. The bottom quintile, the lowest 20 percent by income, saw a whopping 5.6 percent decrease in income in 2016. By contrast, the top 20 percent of income earners gained 2.1 percent increase in income during the same period. This trend has continued into the first quarter of the year. The income disparity between the richest and the poorest has been further widening. What is particularly noteworthy is the fact that the income reduction of the bottom quintile has been occurring for five quarters—over a year. 

This is not a passing phenomenon. Economic indicators revolving around big exporters are improving, but market merchants, microbusiness owners and small and medium-sized enterprises are complaining that business is worse than it was during the foreign exchange crisis of 1997-1998. As a matter of fact, the service industry typified by wholesale and retail trade, restaurants and lodging facilities registered negative growth in the last quarter.

People spend less as their wallets get thinner. Markets and restaurants are not able to hire workers due to slow business. This leads to a decrease in jobs mainly occupied by low-income people. This is the reason why the bottom quintile I mentioned before saw their income dwindle. In the excruciating recession in domestic demand, the neediest are being pushed to the edge of a cliff. 

The degree of economic inequality in Korea is already very severe compared to the rest of the world. The top 10 percent of the income bracket accounts for almost half of total income. Statistically, Korea is second to the United States among the OECD member countries. Considering the reality that a large amount of the incomes of upper-income earners is omitted from taxation, Korea’s economic inequality may be worse than that of the United States.

Under these circumstances, it is truly worrisome that the trend of the rich getting richer and the poor getting poorer is being accelerated. If this course is not corrected, most people cannot be happy. Sustainable growth will not be possible either. Social cohesion will be next to impossible. Democracy will also be reduced to a formality far from its substance and quality. I believe the underlying reason for citizens to take to the streets from a lack of content with a representative democracy lies in this factor.

There is only one solution. That is to increase the number of decent jobs. The ongoing jobless growth should be stopped. We need a great paradigm shift in the economy from creating jobs as a result of growth to achieving growth by creating jobs.

Fellow Koreans and members of the National Assembly, 

When it comes to the economy, it is important not to miss the opportune time. There are concerns that if the current unemployment crisis is left unattended, it could lead to an economic crisis equivalent to a national disaster. If we fail to address these issues now, we might face much more serious problems down the road. Let me reiterate that jobs lie at the center of the matter. 

Of course, it is not easy to tackle this issue all at once. However, we have to do as much as we can right now. By drawing up a supplementary budget, we now have to improve employment conditions and prevent the income gap from widening further. 

Fortunately, it is possible to draft a supplementary budget without increasing taxes or issuing state bonds thanks to good tax revenue both last year and this year. 

If we sit idly by even though we can afford to respond, it would constitute dereliction of duty on the part of the Government and, by extension, dereliction of duty on the part of politicians. Against this backdrop, the Government has formulated a supplementary budget amounting to 11.2 trillion won with a focus on job creation with an expected tax revenue increase of 8.8 trillion won, a budget surplus of 1.1 trillion won and other surplus funds of 1.3 trillion won. 

Fellow Koreans and members of the National Assembly, 

The supplementary budget plan this time is merely an emergency prescription for swiftly responding to a disaster-like unemployment situation and deteriorating unequal distribution of wealth. 

Working out a fundamental job creation policy is a national task that the Government has to carry out along with the private sector. For the fast effectuation of the policy, however, I believe the public sector has to take the initiative. What the public needs is not a small government but a government working to meet the needs of the people. That is a responsible government. 

I ask for your cooperation so that we will be able to implement job creation policies right away from the second half of this year. This will be conducive to the urgently-needed stabilization of the everyday lives of the vulnerable in our society.  

I especially look forward to these Government endeavors giving impetus to job creation efforts in the private sector and request cooperation to this end. 

Fellow Koreans and members of the National Assembly, 

Now, I am going to explain how and where the supplementary budget will be used. 

In line with the goal of the supplementary budget plan, the focus has been placed on job creation and the stabilization of daily lives of ordinary citizens. For the creation of non-temporary and sustainable job opportunities, large-scale infrastructure projects have not been included. Instead, the increase in the allowance for those who are on maternity leave and the expansion of national and public daycare centers, which were common campaign pledges of many parties during the last presidential election, were taken into consideration as much as possible. 

I am going to give more detailed explanations of the supplementary budget plan.

First, the top priority has been placed on young people, our future. It is mainly a budget designed to help create jobs in the public sector and hire more employees or start a new business. With regards to government jobs, the following two points were taken into account. Job creation will mainly come in the areas concerning safety, welfare and education that could contribute to the improvement in everyday services for all people, and it will be confined to on-site jobs that urgently needed additional hiring.   

I am going to start with firefighters. Even though they have changed to a three-shift system from a two-shift system, there has been no additional hiring. Fire departments are far from meeting the number of personnel required by the law, so there aren`t enough workers to board fire trucks and 119 rescue vehicles. This understaffing caused an unfortunate incident in which a paramedic was killed while working as a substitute rescue worker when a typhoon hit last year.   

Next, I am going to talk about civil servants in charge of welfare. Early this year, three such civil servants took their own lives at intervals of one month. As evidenced by these tragedies, they are suffering from a punishing workload and emotional tasks. 

Labor supervisors are also lacking. As of now, one supervisor deals with 12,000 workers and 1,500 businesses. As a result, they cannot even consider cracking down on violations concerning the minimum wage or overdue wages of part-timers. 

The Government is planning to additionally hire a total of 12,000 central and local government workers who will work where the people live and work for their safety, including police officers, noncommissioned officers, civilian employees of the military, mailmen and veterinary inspectors. By doing so, my Administration will improve basic public services. 

The Government also plans to render assistance to public sector jobs where private institutions hire employees, including daycare teachers, caregivers for seniors, dementia care service providers and a child safety corps. If the supplementary budget is passed, it would be possible to create 24,000 social service jobs that are needed for the stabilization of the living of the vulnerable in society. 

The public sector jobs already mentioned are actually for young people. They are preferred by young people. At the same time, as more on-site workers are hired in areas that have been understaffed to meet day-to-day living demands, they are expected to have the effect of killing two birds with one stone, resolving youth unemployment while improving public services related to everyday lives. 

With this supplementary budget plan, the Government is aiming to help create job opportunities in the private sector for young people. By newly working out a youth employment support system for SMEs, the Government will help widen the SMEs` door of employment for young people. If an SME employs two young people, it will be able to hire one more young worker as the Government will provide wages to the third employee for three years. With the supplementary budget plan this time, it would be possible for SMEs to additionally hire 5,000 people. 

A design to help narrow income gap between conglomerates and SMEs has also been reflected in the budget. To this end, reserve funds for compensation for core personnel at SMEs and the number of eligible people will be expanded by a large margin. This measure is expected to help young people working at SMEs to also collect a large sum of money and alleviate manpower shortages facing SMEs. 

In addition, the Government will help more young people boldly take on the challenge of starting a new business. It will greatly increase investment in youth start-ups, including by expanding youth start-up support funds. On top of this, a fund to support starting anew after a failure worth 300 billion won has newly been earmarked to help those who once failed to take up a new challenge. 

The fatigue of young people who are searching for a job while working part-time day and night will be able to be eased a little bit. By newly creating benefits aimed at facilitating youth employment, the Government is planning to first dole out 300,000 won per month for three months to help young people find a job. With the budget plan for the next year, we would be able to implement the new benefits system in earnest. 

The earmarked budget will also help address young people`s residence problem. The Government will additionally provide affordable multi-unit, rental housings in areas near subway stations so that young people can commute with ease. The funds needed to provide 2,700 such housing units have also been earmarked in the supplementary budget plan. 

Speaking of the current young generation that does not even have an opportunity to work, there is a saying that “they will be the first generation that is going to be less well off than their parents.” This is not a story that is only distressing to young adults. It is heartbreaking for parents as well who do not mind undergoing all sorts of hardship, only hoping that their children will live a better life than they are. Insufficient jobs for young adults are not only a problem for children but also for parents. I earnestly ask the Administration and the National Assembly to roll up their sleeves together and take the lead.

Second, there are funds in the budget to increase opportunities for women to work and make their homes happier. In order to prevent them from feeling an economic strain from taking maternity leave, the budget is designed to as much as double the wage they receive during the three months of maternity leave. When maternity leave is over, and there is no one readily available to take care of the children, it feels like the world is coming to an end. The discontinuity in women’s careers is a loss for all women, families and the nation. 

A total of 360 state-run and public daycare centers will be newly established this year as financial assistance will be doubled from what was originally scheduled, helping to ease the burden of childrearing. They will be opened in areas with an absence of private daycare centers. In addition, private daycare centers experiencing operational difficulties will be turned into state-run or public centers, promoting coexistence with the private sector. If the number of assistant teachers or substitute teachers is increased, more jobs will be created; teachers will be able to keep their legal working hours without working overtime, and children will receive better care. There is an allocation in the budget to hire 5,000 additional teachers. 

There are also funds in the budget to help women who want to start working again find jobs more easily. Funds are allocated to newly hire startup managers and career planners at employment service centers and expand job training courses. 

Fine dust has become one of the biggest concerns for parents who are raising children. Funds are allocated to install fine dust monitoring devices at all elementary schools in the country. If the level of fine dust is too high, school principals will be able to respond right away. 

Third, there are funds to support the employment and health of seniors. The elderly will be able to enjoy their later years in a lively manner if they can work as long as their health allows them to. The fact that Korea has the highest rates of elderly poverty and elderly suicide among the OECD nations is a terrible disgrace, and it needs to be solved without fail.   

First of all, the number of public sector jobs for seniors will be increased by 30,000, and employment allowances will be raised from 220,000 won per month to 270,000 per month. Both of which are reflected in the proposed budget. 

If skills and experiences that retirees have are combined with those of young entrepreneurs, it can increase the number of jobs for seniors and help young people starting a business. By encouraging young entrepreneurs and seniors to start a business together, the budget is intended to create jobs that can utilize seniors’ wisdom, experiences and knowledge. 

Dementia is now a fear of all citizens. Seniors and their families should not be left alone to shoulder the pain. A system in which the Government takes responsibility for dementia patients needs to be initiated as soon as possible. Funds are allotted in the budget to increase the number of dementia care centers from the current mere 47 around the country to 252. If dementia care centers are established in every city, county and district in the country, they will reduce the burden of patients and their families by providing not only dementia consulting but also preventing dementia through early diagnostic services. 

Fourth, there is a provision for creating jobs that reflect regional characteristics and strengthen public safety and the livelihood of the less privileged. 

An allocation of funds is designed for improving dilapidated living conditions, such as urban regeneration projects and sewer maintenance. This is intended to increase the number of local jobs and improve the quality of lives of residents. In particular, urban regeneration projects are expected to revive the regional economy and create jobs by strengthening the competitiveness of cities. 

The National Basic Living Security Act creates a system for the most vulnerable group of people. The number of recipients of the benefit will be increased by 41,000 when the unreasonable family support obligation rules are eased. 

Tragedies like the one that occurred at the Guui Station should not happen again. Funds will be provided to improve the emergency screen doors that are part of the platform barriers at subway stations. This will reinforce public safety and help create jobs in related fields at the same time. 

Finally, with the supplementary budget, a total of 3.5 trillion won will be allocated for local autonomous governments as the local subsidy and the local education fund subsidy. I especially ask local governments to concentrate the use of the budget on job creation policies and livelihood related projects that are effective in producing new jobs so that the effect of the supplementary budget can be maximized.   

Distinguished lawmakers, 

The Government hopes that the supplementary budget will help create about 110,000 jobs and improve the livelihood of the less privileged a little. Though it is only a quick remedy, it is something that must be done. Jobs are life itself for the people. Jobs are a minimal form of basic rights that can protect the dignity of humanity.  

The Government cannot tell the people to wait longer when they do not even have the strength to carry on. The Government needs to offer a helping hand without delay when the people are undergoing hardships. It needs to do all it can if the lives of the people can be improved even a little. The budget has been drafted based on the judgment that it is what a government should do and what a country should do. I hope that the National Assembly will work together with the Administration.   

Early this year, the National Assembly directly employed cleaners rather than outsourcing their employment. The Assembly started the pioneering efforts to solve job problems. I have also made up my mind. I am determined to spend every single won in the budget for job creation. All the policy capacity will be concentrated on creating jobs. 

The Assembly and the Administration should put their heads together. The opposition and the ruling parties need to combine their strength. The public and the private sectors should make concerted efforts. 

Let’s do it together. Let’s respond to the desperate appeal of the people to work as much as they can. Let’s wipe off the tears of the less privileged and embrace their pain. It will be a huge comfort for the people if the National Assembly and the Administration cooperate on job creation and the opposition and the ruling parties work together in politics. 

I ask for active cooperation so that the supplementary budget bill can be passed at the earliest date possible, creating the expected effects. I will make sure that all advanced preparations necessary will be made and the proposed budget will be disbursed immediately as soon as the bill is passed by the National Assembly. 

The Administration is doing its best to minimize the vacuum in state affairs as it was launched during an emergency without a transition committee. I ask for the Assembly’s cooperation so that the affairs of state will be normalized at the earliest date possible. 

My Administration and I will respect the Assembly and have heart-to-heart dialogues and discussions. 

Thank you very much.