President Moon Jae-in speaks during a meeting to discuss government measures to fight high youth unemployment, at Cheong Wa Dae on March 15.

By Sohn JiAe

Photos = Cheong Wa Dae

The Korean government is going all-out to improve working conditions for young people with the announcement of a set of special measures to create new, high-quality jobs for youth. The move follows the latest decision by the government to reduce the maximum number of weekly work hours from 68 down to 52. 

On March 15, President Moon Jae-in presided over a meeting to discuss government measures to deal with the high rate of unemployment among young people. The set of concrete plans that was produced at the meeting includes benefits for young employees at small- and mid-sized companies and for the firms themselves. 

For example, the measures include the creation of an additional 180,000 to 220,000 jobs for young people. They will provide KRW 9 million per year for newly-hired regular employees at small- and mid-sized firms. They will offer young employees at small companies and new start-ups exemptions from certain forms of income tax for five years, and they will provide tax credits for companies that hire young people. There’s also a measure to offer young job-seekers KRW 500,000 for six months.

In addition to these measures, to make sure that they go into force immediately, the government has decided to quickly draw up a revised supplementary budget of about KRW 4 trillion and to submit the budget bill to the National Assembly by early April. 

Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Strategy and Finance Kim Dong-yeon explains the need for extraordinary steps to deal with the high rate of unemployment among young people, on March 15.

In the meeting, with 18 ministers and vice ministers in attendance, including Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Strategy and Finance Kim Dong-yeon, Minister of Employment and Labor Kim Young-Joo and Minister of SMEs and Startups Hong Jonghaak, President Moon said, “The core of the government measures announced today is to solve this contradictory situation: small- and mid-sized companies are suffering from a shortage of labor while young people are facing the suffering of not being able to find a job.” 

“I ask that the measures be designed to create a synergy effect, combined with the measure to cut the weekly number of work hours that we’ve recently pushed through. I hope that all these measures will be implemented properly to give hope to young people across our nation,” the president said. 

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