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| Sim Sang-jung, the Justice Party's presidential candidate, waves after announcing her pledges for workers' rights in front of union members at Cheonggye Plaza in central Seoul, Monday. / Korea Times photo by Choi Won-suk |
By Jung Min-ho
Three of the five major presidential candidates pledge to raise the minimum wage to 10,000 won ($8.8) an hour in three years, while the others promise to do so in five years.
The Democratic Party of Korea's Moon Jae-in, the frontrunner in the race, promised to raise the minimum wage to that level by 2020 from the current 6,470 won, on his Facebook page on Labor Day (Monday).
"I will build a country, where hard workers never have to worry about poverty," Moon said. "I promised you that my government won't demand sacrifices from workers in the name of economic growth. It will prioritize values of labor and workers' rights."
According to the Ministry of Gender Equality and Family in March, more than 25 percent of adolescents who have had part-time jobs said they earned even less than the minimum wage because their employers didn't comply with the law.
Moon said he will create a state fund to compensate such workers, and the government will directly demand overdue wage clearance.
Ahn Cheol-soo of the People's Party, vowed to increase the minimum wage to the same level, but at a slower pace. He said he can achieve the 10,000-won mark by the end of his term.
"I will also reinforce education about workers' rights by revising textbooks for students," he told reporters at the party's main office in Seoul.
Ahn planned to pay respect to Jeon Tae-il, a labor activist who burned himself to death in 1970 in protest of miserable working conditions in factories, in front of his statue in central Seoul. But labor union members blocked him from doing so, calling him to stop the "political show."
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The Justice Party's Sim Sang-jung, a lifelong labor activist, also vowed to boost the minimum wage to 10,000 won by 2020, saying she wants to become a "president for all workers."
After paying respects to Jeon near the statue, Sim said she will push ahead with revising the Constitution to strengthen workers' rights.
Yoo Seong-min of the Bareun Party also pledged to raise the minimum wage to 10,000 won by 2022, while Hong Joon-pyo of the Liberty Korea Party promised to do so at Ahn's pace.
To celebrate Labor Day, tens of thousands of trade union members staged rallies across the country. They criticized all the major candidates, saying they need a big minimum wage hike now, not in a few years.
"It has to be raised to 10,000 won now, not by 2020 or 2022," the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions, the country's second-largest umbrella labor organization, said in a statement.
The pledge for a higher minimum wage is getting more momentum as income inequality has widened and workers' share of national income has shrunk over the past decade.
Many politicians and economists have urged the government to help the low-paid workers, who are also consumers after work, as a solution to ease the problem.
Critics, however, warn that a major minimum wage hike in a short period of time could push many people out of work and the first victims will be the least skilled ― the very people the policy is supposed to help.
It is also a politically sensitive issue in Korea, where the rate of self-employed is very high. According to 2013 data from the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, 27.4 percent of the workforce in Korea was self-employed, the fourth highest in the 35-member organization.
Politicians fear that a minimum wage hike might cause a political backlash from those who have to bear the labor costs.
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