hankyoreh

Some of President Park Geun-hye’s signature education and welfare pledges - including free high school education and daycare for elementary school students - are in danger of coming to nothing after the government delegated them to local education offices without a source of funding. Even next year, the fourth year of Park’s presidency, there is little chance that money from the budget will be allocated for these projects.

According to officials at the Ministry of Strategy and Finance interviewed on July 7, the Ministry of Education submitted a tentative budget of 246.11 billion won (US$216.9 million) to implement the free high school education program next year. Free high school, one of President Park‘s election campaign pledges, would involve the government covering registration fees, class tuition, school operating expenses, and textbook costs.

The plan is to begin with small towns, islands, and isolated areas next year and to expand across the country by 2018. Once the free high school education is fully implemented, it will cost more than 2 trillion won (US$1.75 billion) a year. At present, South Korea is the only member of the OECD (Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development) that does not provide free high school education.

“Free high school education will cause a massive outlay of funds. It is a national project and a nationwide program promoted by the central government. As such, the government must also provide financial assistance,” the Ministry of Education said in the documents it submitted to the Ministry of Strategy and Finance.

But the position of the Ministry of Strategy and Finance, which is in charge of the national budget, is that the central government will not be able to fund the project.

“From the time that Park made the pledge, the plan was for the project to be implemented through local education budgets. While the government has not determined its budget yet, it is unlikely that national assistance will be available,” an official in the Ministry’s budget department said.

After deliberating with various agencies, the Ministry will submit the budget bill to the National Assembly in September.

Last year, the Ministry of Education also asked the Ministry of Strategy and Finance to allocate 242.2 billion won for free high school education and 660 billion won for elementary daycare, but neither of these requests were granted. The reason the Ministry of Education is asking for money for the free high school education program again after its request was denied is because it believes it can neither abandon a project pledged by the president nor implement the project using the local education budgets alone.

Local education office budgets, which were already stretched thin, were saddled with the additional burden of providing daycare for three- to five-year-olds, which was originally a central government program. Some local education offices have also been sparring with the central government since last year by refusing to allocate money in their budgets for this daycare program.

In this situation, the Education Ministry believes that local education offices cannot both provide free high school education and expand daycare to elementary school students.

“With tax revenues declining, it we try to fund free high school education, which will cost more than 2 trillion won, with local education budgets, there will be a huge backlash from municipal and provincial education offices,” said a Ministry of Education official responsible for the budget.

Elementary daycare began last year for first and second graders, but insufficient funding has kept the program from expanding any further. With the central government refusing to provide assistance and local budgets unable to cover the cost, the program has basically been left in limbo. The Ministry of Education expects that it will not be able to provide daycare to third and fourth graders next year either.

Local education budgets have weakened because of the government’s inadequate tax base and because of unrealistic economic projections.

Local educational subsidies - which account for 20.27% of internal revenue (income tax and corporate tax) - rose from 38.4 trillion won in 2012 to 41.1 trillion won in 2013, but they have been falling under the Park administration to 40.9 trillion in 2014 and 39.4 trillion won this year.

This year’s local educational subsidy jumped by 1.3 trillion won because of increasing internal revenue, but the central government took back 2.7 trillion won that had been granted because of a faulty economic projection in 2013, ultimately cutting the subsidy by 1.5 trillion won. The subsidy is calculated at a two-year interval.

“The government knows better than anyone that the free high school education and elementary daycare programs cannot be implemented under the current local education budgets. The only way to keep the campaign pledge is to take additional financial measures such as increasing the local educational subsidy from 20.27% of internal revenue or by providing financial support in the central government’s budget,” said Ha Bong-un, professor of education at Kyonggi University.

By Kim So-youn, staff reporter

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