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166174
Mon, 03/07/2011 - 04:13
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(Yonhap Feature) S. Koreans ambivalent about expanding public welfare
By Lee Joon-seung
SEOUL, March 11 (Yonhap) -- Chung Yun-hee, a 39-year-old resident of Suji, a southern Seoul suburb, believes that many mothers she knows would support expanding public welfare such as free school lunches and health care unless such moves would cause a sharp increase in taxes.
"Most of the people in my neighborhood are middle class, yet the majority want the government to do more for medicare, education and children's daycare," she said.
How much more the government should spend to improve public welfare is looming as a hot-button issue ahead of parliamentary and presidential elections scheduled for next year. Election experts say the debate could sway voters.
President Lee Myung-bak's Grand National Party (GNP) is trying hard to discredit a big pitch by its main opposition Democratic Party (DP) for its welfare program that would drastically expand free school meals, free medicare and free daycare.
Chung, who has a son in the third grade, won't say which party she would vote for but she said she supported a liberal candidate in last year's local elections for the top education chief in her home province of Gyeonggi, mainly because he pledged free lunches for school children.
After he was elected, the candidate, Kim Sang-gon, carried out his campaign pledge for free school lunches in the new school semester that began in early March.
"For the Gyeonggi governor, I voted for the ruling conservative party candidate, but I rooted for Kim to take charge of schools," she said.
She conceded, however, that her support for the liberal education candidate was contingent largely on that there would be no increase in taxes.
"I believe people should pay more if they want to have access to more services, but I don't really want the government to take more from my family's earnings, which are already strained by sending my boy to private academies," Chung stressed.
She added that instead of universal expansion of welfare that may cost too much, it may be better to require the wealthy to pay more taxes so that middle- or low-income earners would pay less but still receive more benefits.
This view was echoed by Park Joo-hun, a mid-tiered software salesperson in Guro in southwestern Seoul, who said he would like to see South Korea evolve into a welfare nation like Finland.
Citing increasing private educational outlays for their children, the 42-year-old father of one daughter said he and many of his associates prefer a broader social security network.
In his case, Park said, the need to pay back a loan he took out to buy his modest apartment home in Gunpo, a small town outside of Seoul, and pitching in to help pay for medical expenses of his aged mother all make it virtually impossible for him to prepare for retirement.
"If either my wife or I got sick, we would have to sell our home, so free health care will be very welcome, along with lower college tuitions," he said.
Park said, however, that he would object to expanding welfare if it causes too much constraint on his household income balance.
The assistant manager said that it may be a good idea to levy more taxes on the rich and let them pay more for various services so that ordinary people would pay less or not at all.
He also repudiated claims by both the ruling and opposition parties that they can do more to improve welfare if they win next year's elections.
"The GNP claims the Lee Myung-bak administration has spent a record amount of its budget on welfare, but I have not benefited at all," he complained.
He was also suspicious of the opposition party's pledge to drastically increase welfare spending if it comes to power.
"The opposition's offers are too good to be true," Park said. "I'm afraid that increased welfare may lead to more taxes."
The liberal opposition DP, which was dethroned in 2008 after 10 years of rule, estimates that its welfare program would cost only an additional 16.4 trillion won (US$14.5 billion), an amount that can easily be covered by new taxes to be levied on the wealthy, which would amount to 43 trillion won.
"The scheme is achievable if appropriate actions are taken," Kim Jin-pyo, a ranking DP lawmaker, said on a recent radio talk show, claiming that welfare should be seen as an integral part of national strategy for sustainable growth.
The conservative ruling party dismissed as unrealistic its rival party's claim, arguing that it would need at least 30 trillion won to cover all of the needed costs and expenses.
There are detractors even in the opposition camp. Rhyu Si-min who served as the health and welfare minister under former President Roh Moo-hyun (2003-2008), argues that the DP's plan is nothing but a political ploy to win votes.
Suh Seong-hwan, an economics professor at Seoul's Yonsei University, says he can't support the so-called universal welfare coverage that includes free school lunches, because it would affect other important policy goals such as helping underprivileged children.
He warned that expanded welfare may be popular with constituents but it can cause serious repercussions for the country down the road.
"Who would really oppose free meals or medicare?" the scholar asked. "But if a politician says he or she would offer 1 million won to everyone, would it be really good for the country, or would it actually be possible?"
A recent series of public polls show ambivalent views being taken by Koreans with regard to the government's welfare policy.
A poll, jointly conducted by liberal newspaper Hankyoreh Shinmun and the Korea Society Opinion Institute, showed that 59.1 percent of the 800 respondents feel that Seoul's welfare program is inadequate. The findings also showed that 53 percent said they would pay more taxes to increase welfare coverage, although just below 46 percent opposed tax hikes.
In a similar survey by the conservative Chosun Ilbo, 50.3 percent of the 700 people polled supported free welfare, although 51.6 percent said they did not want more welfare if it means more taxes.
Yun Hee-suk, a senior fellow at the state-run Korea Development Institute (KDI) said that in most advanced Western countries, both blanket and specific types of welfare that aim to help certain classes of society are being pursued.
She proposed that instead of non-productive debate on whether welfare programs should help everyone or focus solely on those who can ill afford, South Korea should take a pragmatic approach, balancing itself between social needs and fiscal constraints.
"Details of targeted benefits must be set clearly in advance to prevent a fiscal crisis yet still meet growing need to enhance social welfare," she said.
SEOUL, March 11 (Yonhap) -- Chung Yun-hee, a 39-year-old resident of Suji, a southern Seoul suburb, believes that many mothers she knows would support expanding public welfare such as free school lunches and health care unless such moves would cause a sharp increase in taxes.
"Most of the people in my neighborhood are middle class, yet the majority want the government to do more for medicare, education and children's daycare," she said.
How much more the government should spend to improve public welfare is looming as a hot-button issue ahead of parliamentary and presidential elections scheduled for next year. Election experts say the debate could sway voters.
President Lee Myung-bak's Grand National Party (GNP) is trying hard to discredit a big pitch by its main opposition Democratic Party (DP) for its welfare program that would drastically expand free school meals, free medicare and free daycare.
Chung, who has a son in the third grade, won't say which party she would vote for but she said she supported a liberal candidate in last year's local elections for the top education chief in her home province of Gyeonggi, mainly because he pledged free lunches for school children.
After he was elected, the candidate, Kim Sang-gon, carried out his campaign pledge for free school lunches in the new school semester that began in early March.
"For the Gyeonggi governor, I voted for the ruling conservative party candidate, but I rooted for Kim to take charge of schools," she said.
She conceded, however, that her support for the liberal education candidate was contingent largely on that there would be no increase in taxes.
"I believe people should pay more if they want to have access to more services, but I don't really want the government to take more from my family's earnings, which are already strained by sending my boy to private academies," Chung stressed.
She added that instead of universal expansion of welfare that may cost too much, it may be better to require the wealthy to pay more taxes so that middle- or low-income earners would pay less but still receive more benefits.
This view was echoed by Park Joo-hun, a mid-tiered software salesperson in Guro in southwestern Seoul, who said he would like to see South Korea evolve into a welfare nation like Finland.
Citing increasing private educational outlays for their children, the 42-year-old father of one daughter said he and many of his associates prefer a broader social security network.
In his case, Park said, the need to pay back a loan he took out to buy his modest apartment home in Gunpo, a small town outside of Seoul, and pitching in to help pay for medical expenses of his aged mother all make it virtually impossible for him to prepare for retirement.
"If either my wife or I got sick, we would have to sell our home, so free health care will be very welcome, along with lower college tuitions," he said.
Park said, however, that he would object to expanding welfare if it causes too much constraint on his household income balance.
The assistant manager said that it may be a good idea to levy more taxes on the rich and let them pay more for various services so that ordinary people would pay less or not at all.
He also repudiated claims by both the ruling and opposition parties that they can do more to improve welfare if they win next year's elections.
"The GNP claims the Lee Myung-bak administration has spent a record amount of its budget on welfare, but I have not benefited at all," he complained.
He was also suspicious of the opposition party's pledge to drastically increase welfare spending if it comes to power.
"The opposition's offers are too good to be true," Park said. "I'm afraid that increased welfare may lead to more taxes."
The liberal opposition DP, which was dethroned in 2008 after 10 years of rule, estimates that its welfare program would cost only an additional 16.4 trillion won (US$14.5 billion), an amount that can easily be covered by new taxes to be levied on the wealthy, which would amount to 43 trillion won.
"The scheme is achievable if appropriate actions are taken," Kim Jin-pyo, a ranking DP lawmaker, said on a recent radio talk show, claiming that welfare should be seen as an integral part of national strategy for sustainable growth.
The conservative ruling party dismissed as unrealistic its rival party's claim, arguing that it would need at least 30 trillion won to cover all of the needed costs and expenses.
There are detractors even in the opposition camp. Rhyu Si-min who served as the health and welfare minister under former President Roh Moo-hyun (2003-2008), argues that the DP's plan is nothing but a political ploy to win votes.
Suh Seong-hwan, an economics professor at Seoul's Yonsei University, says he can't support the so-called universal welfare coverage that includes free school lunches, because it would affect other important policy goals such as helping underprivileged children.
He warned that expanded welfare may be popular with constituents but it can cause serious repercussions for the country down the road.
"Who would really oppose free meals or medicare?" the scholar asked. "But if a politician says he or she would offer 1 million won to everyone, would it be really good for the country, or would it actually be possible?"
A recent series of public polls show ambivalent views being taken by Koreans with regard to the government's welfare policy.
A poll, jointly conducted by liberal newspaper Hankyoreh Shinmun and the Korea Society Opinion Institute, showed that 59.1 percent of the 800 respondents feel that Seoul's welfare program is inadequate. The findings also showed that 53 percent said they would pay more taxes to increase welfare coverage, although just below 46 percent opposed tax hikes.
In a similar survey by the conservative Chosun Ilbo, 50.3 percent of the 700 people polled supported free welfare, although 51.6 percent said they did not want more welfare if it means more taxes.
Yun Hee-suk, a senior fellow at the state-run Korea Development Institute (KDI) said that in most advanced Western countries, both blanket and specific types of welfare that aim to help certain classes of society are being pursued.
She proposed that instead of non-productive debate on whether welfare programs should help everyone or focus solely on those who can ill afford, South Korea should take a pragmatic approach, balancing itself between social needs and fiscal constraints.
"Details of targeted benefits must be set clearly in advance to prevent a fiscal crisis yet still meet growing need to enhance social welfare," she said.
