[비즈한국] As the official campaign period for the 21st presidential election began on the 12th, the major candidates unveiled their "Top 10 Presidential Pledges." Lee Jae-myung, the presidential candidate for the Democratic Party of Korea, announced his 10 pledges on this day, centering on the three major visions of "A Strong Nation, Prosperous People: Recovery, Growth, and Happiness." Kim Moon-soo, the presidential candidate for the People Power Party, submitted his 10 pledges under the banner of "Forward Anew, A Great Republic of Korea."
In this presidential election, both Candidate Lee and Candidate Kim appear to have made economic growth their No. 1 pledge out of their top 10, likely in consideration of recent global advancements in artificial intelligence (AI) and the U.S.-led tariff war. However, concerns are emerging regarding the feasibility of these candidates' primary pledges, given that since the 2012 election—when presidential candidates began unveiling their "Top 10 Pledges"—the implementation of the No. 1 pledge, which the elected president touted as most important, has generally been lackluster.
The No. 1 pledge among the 10 pledges of former President Park Geun-hye, who won the 2012 election, was "Economic Democratization to Enhance Fairness." In her pledge booklet, former President Park stated, "While our economy has emphasized efficiency, fairness has been relatively overlooked," and pointed to issues such as acts of pursuing private interests by major shareholders, abuse of market dominance by large conglomerates, and economic power abuse through collusion.
To overcome this, former President Park announced that she would realize economic democratization by establishing a fair market economic order and protecting the economically vulnerable, including the working class, small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), and non-regular workers. However, she was not only impeached for charges including conspiring with Choi Seo-won (formerly Choi Soon-sil) to provide favors such as support for the succession of the Samsung Group's management, and accepting bribes (third-party bribery), but was also sentenced to 20 years in prison and a fine of 18 billion won.
The No. 1 pledge among the 10 pledges of former President Moon Jae-in, who was elected in the 2017 presidential election, was "A Republic of Korea Responsible for Jobs." To this end, former President Moon proposed creating 810,000 jobs centered on the public sector, job sharing through shortened working hours, resolving the disparity for non-regular workers, and raising the minimum wage to 10,000 won. While the hiring of public institutions and civil servants increased rapidly during his term, only about 240,000 decent, regular jobs were created, and even those came with significant side effects.
According to ALIO, the management information disclosure system for public institutions, the number of employees at public institutions increased by 115,091 (35.0%), from 328,479 in 2016 before former President Moon took office to 443,570 at the end of 2021. According to the Ministry of the Interior and Safety, the number of civil servants increased by 130,266 (12.6%), from 1,032,331 before his inauguration to 1,162,597.
However, some public institutions, such as KEPCO015760, which began converting employees to regular status in line with the goal of resolving non-regular employment, reduced new hiring as they could not cope with rising labor costs. Furthermore, the problem of skyrocketing public institution debt emerged. This eventually led to a reduction in new hiring for both public institutions and civil servants under the subsequent administration. Additionally, the rapid increase in the minimum wage caused side effects such as business closures among the self-employed.
Former President Yoon’s No. 1 pledge among his top 10 was "Emergency Relief for Overcoming COVID-19 and a Post-COVID Plan." To this end, he promised compensation for small business owners who suffered damage due to government regulations and business closures during the COVID-19 pandemic. In line with his No. 1 pledge, former President Yoon vowed to provide 50 trillion won in financial support for loss compensation upon taking office.
However, according to government economic performance data released one year after former President Yoon's inauguration, approximately 23 trillion won in loss compensation was paid to 3.73 million small business owners. Including the 1.6 trillion won cost for improving the loss compensation system, the total amount spent on loss compensation was 24.6 trillion won. This was only half of the 50 trillion won originally promised.
For this election, Candidate Lee Jae-myung has put forward "Becoming a World-Leading Economic Powerhouse" as his No. 1 pledge, proposing to become one of the top 3 AI nations, preparing large-scale intensive investment plans for national high-tech industries, realizing a global top 4 venture powerhouse, and expanding stable research and development (R&D) budgets. However, critics point out that it is difficult to achieve such pledges without a clear stance on the 52-hour workweek exception demanded by the semiconductor industry.
Candidate Kim Moon-soo announced "Freedom-Driven Growth and a Business-Friendly Country" as his No. 1 pledge, presenting the creation of a world-class investment environment as an implementation method. However, he has shown hesitation in removing political uncertainty, such as only offering an apology for the martial law declared by former President Yoon—the biggest negative factor for our economy—after the start of his presidential campaign.