Cutting Budgets for 14 Government Job Programs with Low Private Employment Performance

'Reduction Grade' for Forest Disaster Jobs... Saeil Women Intern Project Achieves 94.8% Employment Rate
Direct Job Retention Rate with Financial Input at 38%, but Government Praises It as "Well Done"

[Image source=Yonhap News]

[Sejong=Asia Economy Reporter Moon Chaeseok] The Korea Forest Service's forest disaster job project was classified as a budget reduction target due to poor performance last year. This employment policy targets vulnerable groups in rural and fishing villages for forest disaster prevention tasks such as pest control, forest fires, and landslides. While it may be a core project from the ministry's perspective, it was judged that the results leading to private sector employment were not very high.

On the 5th, the Ministry of Employment and Labor released a report evaluating the performance of government job projects last year, including this information. Since 2018, government performance evaluations have been conducted annually, with experts from national research institutes such as the Korea Labor Institute and universities participating in the evaluations.

Among the 171 projects promoted last year, 145 projects excluding new projects were evaluated in four stages: 'Excellent,' 'Good,' 'Needs Improvement,' and 'Reduction.' In particular, the reduction grade was set to account for more than 10% of the total. Accordingly, 14 projects, including forest disaster jobs, received the reduction grade.

These projects were often criticized for low employment in related sectors such as private companies by participants. The criticism was that the job projects did not lead to activation of employment in the private sector. Projects such as the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism's 'Museum Operation Activation' and the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy's 'Reemployment of Career-Interrupted Female Researchers' were also evaluated as having limitations in participants' employment in related fields.

The Ministry of Gender Equality and Family's 'Support for Promoting Women's Economic Activities' (Saeil Women Intern) project received an excellent grade with a 94.8% employment rate among participants. There were 14 projects in total, accounting for 10%, that received the excellent grade like this project.

Job projects include not only direct job projects that provide temporary public sector jobs for vulnerable groups but also vocational training, employment services, employment incentives, start-up support, and unemployment income support projects. The employment maintenance subsidy, which falls under employment incentives, had an expenditure of 2.3 trillion won last year, 33 times more than the previous year. Job-seeking benefits amounted to 11.9 trillion won, increasing by 46.5% during the same period. This was due to a significant increase in employment incentives and unemployment income support projects in response to the employment shock caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.

However, regarding direct jobs mainly for short-term elderly employment, the Ministry of Employment and Labor gave a generous self-assessment, stating that "it provided a safety net role for vulnerable groups and offered work experience opportunities for youth and career-interrupted women." A total of 2.95 trillion won, accounting for 8.8% of the total job budget, was invested in direct jobs. According to the 'Efficiency Plan for Financially Supported Job Projects' announced by the Ministry of Employment and Labor on the 8th of last month, the employment retention rate of government direct job projects last year was 37.8%, down 13.5 percentage points from the previous year. This means that out of 10 people, the number who retained their jobs decreased from 5 in 2019 to less than 4 last year.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.