27th Ministerial Meeting on Boosting the Economy
29th Ministerial Meeting on the Economy of 2019
Government to Promote AI Across Industries and the Society
Deputy Prime Minister Hong Nam-ki presided over the 27h Ministerial Meeting on Boosting the Economy held on December 11, that is, the 29th Ministerial Meeting on the Economy of this year. Plans to promote AI across industries and the society, so-called the national AI promotion initiative, were one of main topics of discussion, along with the supplementary measures to soft-land the 52 hour workweek arrangement and plans to support high tech ventures, such as those working on a system on a chip, biohealth and future cars. DPM Hong talked at the beginning of the meeting about the November job market data and the 2020 budget proposal passed last night at the National Assembly.
The following is a summary of Deputy Prime Minister Hong’s keynote address.
November job market data
The November job market fared well as the economy added 331,000 jobs year-on-year and the unemployment rate continued to be low at 3.1 percent. Employment rose in all age groups except the 40s. Manufacturing jobs continued to decline, but at a slower rate, from 81,000 losses of last month to 26,000.
Permanent jobs grew by 593,000, the largest since February 2014 when 673,000 jobs were added, and those covered by unemployment insurance has been expanding. Young adult jobs increased by 63,000. The young adult employment rate hit the highest since 2005 among the November data of other years at 44.3 percent, and the unemployment rate marked the lowest since 2012 among the November data of other years at 7.0 percent. Given this, employment growth for this year would likely go beyond the target of 200,000 jobs.
2020 budget bill passed at the National Assembly
The 2020 budget bill was passed at the National Assembly last night, a total of 512.3 trillion won approved, along with other bills to help boost the economy, such as the bills to promote reshoring, industry-university cooperation and P2P lending. However, other economy-boost bills have still been waiting to be passed at the National Assembly, including the revisions to the three data Acts and Labor Standard Act, and bills to promote suppliers and ventures. I ask the National Assembly to pass those bills and revisions as soon as possible.
2020 economic policies
The government is in the final stage of completing the 2020 economic policies. The economic policies for next year will continue to focus on employment growth and industrial restructuring for the future. Promoting ventures will be one of the 2020 policies, and the government will work to help ventures to grow into unicorns. The number of unicorn ventures have increased from two in 2016 to 11 in 2019, which has placed the country in the fifth position with Germany.
AI Promotion Initiative
The government will soon announce plans to promote AI across industries and the society, which will contain the following:
- Develop high-level AI technologies, such as next generation AI, and grow AI enterprises
- Promote AI across all sectors of the economy
- Improve institutions to prepare in advance for changes AI will bring about
Supplementary measures to soft-land 52 hour workweek
The government has drawn up measures to supplement the 52 hour workweek arrangement. We will do the following to help companies resolve difficulties the 52 hour workweek will likely cause.
- Give enough time to prepare for it to companies with 50 to 299 employees
- Revise laws to allow extended work hours when it is required due to surges in workload or due to R&D activities
- Strengthen recruitment support, which will cover the employment of overseas workforce
Plans to support high tech ventures working on the BIG 3
The BIG 3 industries, a system on a chip, biohealth and future cars, will take ventures a lot of time and investment to produce profit out of them. Thus, it is necessary for the government to reform the current support system, short-term and task-based, in order to make it long-term and more effective. The government will do the following.
- First, select a total of 250 ventures, 50 of a system on a chip, 100 of biohealth and 100 of future cars
- Provide them with R&D support, as well as support for technology-commercialization
- Up to 10 billion won of support to be made available through Korea SMEs and Startups Agency, and up to 3 billion won through Korea Technology Finance Corporation
Please refer to the attached pdf