Minister of Labor: “Regional job policies are led by local governments and only supported by the central government.”

Minister of Employment and Labor Kim Young-hoon said on the 4th, “We need to change the paradigm of local job policies,” and added, “If local governments come up with ideas, the central government should only support them and not interfere.”

Minister Kim appeared on KNN's 'Morning Wide', a private broadcaster in Busan and Gyeongnam, and answered related questions as follows.

He said, "Until now, employment policies were planned by the central government and implemented by local governments, but now this needs to be fundamentally changed. If a local government that knows the region well comes up with an idea, the central government should only support it and not interfere. We need to change the paradigm."

As a representative example, the Ministry of Labor presented the 'Buul-Gyeong Metropolitan Joint Project' launched in September last September with metropolitan local governments.

This is a project to build a job ecosystem that transcends administrative boundaries by preventing population outflow from the region and promoting the inflow of people outside the region. This project, which unites Busan, Ulsan, and Gyeongnam into one community, will be carried out for four years from this year to 2029.

Minister Kim explained, “Gyeongnam and Ulsan are strong in manufacturing, and Busan is relatively specialized in maritime and media,” adding, “If we secure mobility rights for young people who want to live in Busan, there will be more options for young people.”

He emphasized, “For this project to be successful, the right to movement must be smoothened, and that is the ‘connection.’ Only if this project succeeds will conditions be created for young people to stay in the region. We will make it a success.”

Regarding the job fair being promoted as part of the project, he said, "Based on university and industry-academia linkages, we will present a living area that combines education, industry, culture, and residential infrastructure," and "We will develop it into an expo that gives young people the belief that 'it would be good to take root here.'"

In addition, Minister Kim selected ‘resolving unfairness in the workplace’ as a task he would like to accomplish during his remaining term.

Minister Kim said, “The core of the employment and labor policy is to ensure that workers who go out to work do not experience injustice,” and added, “We will pursue three goals to the end to prevent people from being killed or injured at work, from having money taken away from them even after working, and from being discriminated against while doing similar work.”