The Korea Times

Enlivening housing market

Nation needs to overhaul real estate policy The Park Geun-hye administration is now going all out to reinvigorate the dormant housing market, reducing new supplies and lowering taxes. Will these measures work? Yes, but only temporarily. Should the government repeat this approach whenever the property market sags, then? No, definitely not. In a joint news conference of economic ministries Monday, officials announced their decision to cut property acquisition taxes, saying that they will come up with details, including a lowered rate, by the end of next month. The government is basically going in the right direction, because the property purchase tax of up to 4 percent here is far higher than most advanced countries, such as the United States (1 percent), Canada (1.3 percent), and Britain (2 percent). But the nation’s tax rate for holding properties, at 0.2-0.4 percent, is way below those of industrial countries, which averages at around 1 percent. That means, if the government lowers acquisition tax without raising property-holding tax, it will result in a bi

Jul 31, 2013By Ahn Seong-jin

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Fraudulent river project

When former President Lee Myung-bak backed away from his trademark “Grand Korean Waterway” project for the refurbishment of the four longest rivers in 2009, critics suspected the two were basically the same things. A report by the Board of Audit and Inspection (BAI) Wednesday officially confirmed the suspicion as a fact. The auditory report of the four-river restoration project, the third such one by the administrative watchdog, shows how Cheong Wa Dae twisted the arms of the Land and Transportation Ministry into dredging riverbeds deeper and building weirs larger to turn rivers into a de facto canal. It was only eight months after former President Lee officially gave up his pet project in the face of enormous popular opposition to it because of its dubious economic viability and environmental hazards. The Blue House told the Land-Transportation Ministry to remain ready to return to the canal construction if and when the “social atmosphere changes.” But the BAI report shows they waited only until public uproar calmed down. BAI officials say they

Jul 19, 2013By Ahn Seong-jin

Learning English

Fair sharing of cost

The Korean and U.S. officials who have just started talks on sharing defense costs hope to finish their negotiations by Oct. 31. But their wishes might remain as such, given the sharp difference over their shared ratio and, more seriously, growing suspicions here about various aspects of the 22-year-long scheme. Washington is now pressing to raise Seoul’s share to 50 percent of the cost for stationing U.S. Forces Korea in the next five years, from the present 40 percent. In a report in April, the U.S. Senate Arms Services Committee also backed up the U.S. administration, saying that although the stationing cost continued to grow, Korea’s share fell short of meeting the increased burden.  This defies our understanding. Since the two countries began to share defense costs, Korea’s financial contribution has grown 8.1 times, from 107.3 billion won in 1991 to 869.5 billion won this year, while Korea’s total defense spending grew only 4.6 times. The portion of cost-sharing for U.S. troops out of the nation’s overall defense outlay also nearly r

Jul 12, 2013By Ahn Seong-jin

Learning English

Who deserve tax breaks?

Reform must not put burdens on most vulnerable classes There are no fewer than 226 different kinds of tax cuts in Korea. Revenue loss from these reduced and exempted taxes amount to 30 trillion won ($27 billion) a year, or nearly half of all earned income. This can hardly appear normal to anyone’s eyes. The government is therefore right to roll up its sleeves to reform the complicated, and often ineffective, tax credit system. So is the direction of the systemic overhaul, which focuses on abolishing or reducing various tax benefits heavily skewed in favor of large businesses and wealthy individuals.   For instance, the tax cuts for capital spending, or investment into plants and equipment, were renewed once again this year, although it had long been on the ``sunset list” during the past 18 years. The proposed revision to the tax code also aims to sharply curtail tax breaks for businesses’ and research and development spending, which have mainly benefited the affiliates of family-controlled conglomerates.  If and when these tax cuts

Jul 5, 2013By Ahn Seong-jin

Learning English

Give talk a chance

A person is not deceived who knows he is being deceivedNorth Korea has repeatedly made military provocations, turned to dialogue and won diplomatic concessions and economic aid. So it would be easy for allies to ridicule and spurn Pyongyang’s offer on Sunday for direct talks with the United States as just the latest of these numerous cycles.And so it seems indeed. It doesn’t take diplomatic experts to see through what analysts describe as the North’s ``dialogue offensive” aimed at avoiding its diplomatic isolation, coming right after the summit between the U.S. and China and just prior to one between China and South Korea.The content of its offer deepens skepticism among foreigners even further. Instead of making any specific proposals to rein in its nuclear programs, the North’s statement calls for a denuclearization of the entire Korean Peninsula, meaning Washington should take its nuclear umbrella away from South Korea. Its offer to discuss a nuclear-free world through mutual disarmament even smacks of megalomania.The North’s latest proposal is

Jun 21, 2013By Ahn Seong-jin

Learning English

Toward a thaw

Sincere talks needed to make up for lost five years                                               Breaking a six-year hiatus, South and North Korea will resume high-level talks in Seoul Wednesday. Both governments deserve compliments for overcoming escalating military tension and various political difficulties that continue to trouble this divided peninsula.  However, negotiators from both Koreas face a long, turbulent road ahead.  Nothing illustrated this better than the marathon, working-group meeting at the truce village of Panmunjeom over the weekend, which heralded both the possibilities and limitations of the upcoming talks, too.  After haggling over an agenda and attendees for 17 hours, the two sides failed to reach a complete agreement and issued separate press releases. South Korean officials adhered to upgrading t

Jun 15, 2013By Ahn Seong-jin

Learning English

Inter-Korean impasse

End wasteful war-of-nerves, reopen talks One point that distinguishes the Park Geun-hye administration from its predecessor is a more flexible policy toward North Korea. But whatever the reason may be, inter-Korean relations have become worse, not better, since Park was elected five months ago. North Korea is far more responsible for the current deadlock, as it has been in most cases. However, as always, the South is in a far better position to dissolve it _ if only Seoul wishes to do so.    A case in point is the inter-Korean squabbling over the Gaeseong Industrial Complex. There is no doubt that the North caused the joint factory park to stop operating, citing the ridiculous excuse that the South bruised its communist pride. Pyongyang was apparently making false charges or at least exaggerated the minor faults of Seoul. Yet Seoul’s ``take-it-or-leave-it” response was also somewhat hasty.  The buck-passing and nitpicking between the two Koreas have become pettier recently. North Korea belatedly made public that it expressed an intention

May 26, 2013By Ahn Seong-jin

Learning English

Disclosing executive pay

Many Koreans know Apple CEO Tim Cook’s annual income reached 434 billion won ($378 million) in 2011. But few know how much his Korean counterpart, Lee Kun-hee - Lee’s official title used to be the chairman of Samsung Electronics - receives a year. And the yearly emolument of Lee, probably the richest man in Korea, will likely remain in the dark for some time unless loopholes are plugged in ongoing legislation. The proposed law, a rare bipartisan push by the National Assembly as part of its “economic democratization” efforts, calls for disclosing the pay of senior executives who earn 500 million won or more a year. But the new act limits its targets to only “registered” executives, letting unregistered managers, who account for a quarter of the total and include the Samsung Group’s owner and his son and heir-apparent, slip through. This is simply not fair. If the law is allowed to stand as it is now, other tycoons and senior executives could deregister themselves in part to keep their pay secret and to avoid responsibility when

Apr 19, 2013By Ahn Seong-jin

Learning English

Presidential apology

Voters can judge a new leader by the people he or she selects for their inaugural Cabinet. Lee Myung-bak’s presidency showed initial signs of failure when a couple of his first appointees — cronies from the same region, school or church as Lee — had to bow out. Five years later, Koreans have a similar, and far graver, ominous feeling. Six of President Park Geun-hye’s ministerial picks have withdrawn so far, and for more serious problems than simple cronyism, such as stints as a broker, a sex scandal and assets hidden overseas. But what sets apart the incumbent leader from her predecessor is Park’s response — or lack thereof — to popular criticism. On Saturday, a Cheong Wa Dae spokeswoman read a two-sentence (63-letter) apology to the public for the appointment fiasco, signed by Park’s chief of staff. The "three-layered” apology — if it can be called such at all — was a cold reminder of how Park views the public and presidential leadership. It was small surprise then tha

Apr 12, 2013By Ahn Seong-jin

Learning English

Park's economic policy

Remove self-contradiction within ‘Geunhye-nomics’ first It is clear what President Park Geun-hye’s economic policy, dubbed “Geunhye-nomics,” aims at _ better distribution through continuous growth. Far less certain is how to achieve that.Park and her economic aides have wrapped up this simple goal in fluffy terms such as “economic democratization” and “creative economy.” These are slogans more rhetorical than real, and few seem to know exactly what they mean, let alone how to realize them. It was small surprise then that Park’s economic team, which got together Monday for the first time since her administration took office a month ago, came up with few tangible programs. Officials say they will unveil major policy directions later this week, and specific action plans by early next month. Voters have few choices but to wait and see. Yet we can hardly remain optimistic about the success of Geunhye-nomics as it is now. Above all, there are too wide gaps between its goals and the circumstances surrounding the

Apr 5, 2013By Ahn Seong-jin

Ahn Seong-jin

Read more

Enlivening housing market

Fraudulent river project

Fair sharing of cost

Who deserve tax breaks?

Give talk a chance

Toward a thaw

Inter-Korean impasse

Disclosing executive pay

Presidential apology

Park's economic policy

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