New government plan opens up possibility of 80.5-hour work week in Korea

Posted on : 2023-03-07 17:20 KST Modified on : 2023-03-07 17:20 KST
If adopted, the plan would nullify the current cap on weekly working hours at 52
President Yoon Suk-yeol pays a visit to the SNU Children’s Hospital in Seoul on Feb. 22. (Yoon Woon-sik/The Hankyoreh)
President Yoon Suk-yeol pays a visit to the SNU Children’s Hospital in Seoul on Feb. 22. (Yoon Woon-sik/The Hankyoreh)

The South Korean government has unveiled a plan to make working hours more flexible by raising the cap from the current level of 52 hours a week to a maximum of 80.5 hours a week.

That’s part of a plan to update regulations on working hours that was approved by the heads of the Ministry of Employment and Labor and other related ministries in an emergency meeting in Seoul on Monday.

“These reforms are aimed at guaranteeing the right to choice, the right to health and the right to rest. We intend to break with an outdated framework that is now 70 years old and establish a new paradigm for working hours,” Labor Minister Lee Jung-sik said while explaining the proposed update.

The reforms announced by the government would increase the maximum number of hours allowed per week from the current level of 52 (a 40-hour standard workweek plus 12 hours of weekly overtime) to 80.5 hours, assuming a seven-day workweek. (There would be a maximum of 69 hours in a six-day workweek.)

Employers would be allowed to cluster overtime hours on a monthly, quarterly or yearly basis, but would be required to give employees working 65 hours or more a week at least 11 hours of unbroken rest between the end of one workday and the beginning of the next.

The government also plans to look into a “white collar exemption,” under which the working hours cap and overtime pay rules would not apply to high-income professional workers with a considerable amount of autonomy over their work and start-up employees who hold a company stake of a certain amount.

The government has also proposed changes to the “selective work scheme” under which working hours can vary across a month (or three months for R&D), as long as the total in the period averages to 40 hours a week. The plan would allow the scheme to run for three months in all industries and up to six months in R&D fields.

That would make it possible for companies to increase or decrease their staff’s working hours while maintaining a nominal 40-hour workweek and thus avoiding overtime pay.

Minister of Employment and Labor Lee Jung-sik announces the administration’s proposal for amending the 52-hour work week system in Korea on March 6 from the government’s complex in Seoul. (Yonhap)
Minister of Employment and Labor Lee Jung-sik announces the administration’s proposal for amending the 52-hour work week system in Korea on March 6 from the government’s complex in Seoul. (Yonhap)

The Ministry of Employment and Labor responded to criticism that the relaxed rules would put workers in the position of doing long hours on certain weeks or in certain jobs at their employers’ whim.

“Management of the total amount of overtime will be handled through written deliberations with workers’ representatives. Since overtime work is carried out with the consent of the parties concerned, it would be possible to prevent long working hours through various direct and indirect mechanisms,” the ministry explained.

In connection with this, the ministry said it intends to update the worker representative system. “We will protect the activities of worker representatives by forbidding employers from treating them unfairly or meddling in or disrupting their elections and activities. At the same time, we will require those representatives to canvass and accommodate the opinions of a wide range of workers.”

However, a fair number of the provisions in the government’s proposed reforms would require a revision of the Labor Standards Act. The government plans to solicit public comment on those revisions by April 17 and submit the bill to the National Assembly in June or July.

By Bang Jun-ho, staff reporter

Please direct questions or comments to [english@hani.co.kr]

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