By Park Si-soo
Staff reporter

The Constitutional Court Thursday ruled that a law giving visually impaired people exclusive right to work as licensed masseurs was constitutional in a 6-3 decision.

“Given that visually impaired people face various forms of discrimination, the law is a means to guarantee minimum social equality. In this sense, this law does not infringe upon the freedom of choice of jobs,” said Lee Kang-kuk, president of the court.

This was the response to a complaint filed by a group of unlicensed masseurs in 2008, who argued the exclusive right to the blind infringed upon their freedom of job choice.

Japanese colonialists in 1913 introduced to Korea the idea of reserving the role of masseurs solely for the blind.

The prohibition against people with healthy sight was abolished in 1946 by the United States military government but was later reinstated in 1963.

In 2003, massage workers with sight challenged the prohibition, but the court ruled in favor of continuing to restrict the trade.

But in 2006, the court issued a ruling favorable to the sighted, saying that restricting people’s choice of jobs by government directive was “excessively” discriminatory, and in the 2008 ruling overturned it again.

About 7,100 legally blind people work in about 1,000 massage parlors in Korea.

But observers say they can hardly meet the demand, and so tens of thousands of so-called sports massage centers, skin-care salons, barber shops, hotels and public bath houses employ sighted, but illegal, masseurs. Estimates of their number range from 150,000 to 700,000.