[Report] "Worried if Crunch Will Return"... IT Workers Shaking Over '120-Hour Work Weeks'

Yoon President-Elect's Labor Pledge Raises IT Workers' Concerns
'Labor Flexibility' Forecasted... Mention of "120 Hours per Week"
Developers Worry "Crunch Time May Return"
Experts Say "Illegal Overtime Still Prevalent in Korean Workplaces"
"Priority Should Be to Prevent Long Illegal Working Hours"

On the morning of the 23rd, near Gasan Digital Complex Station in Seoul during the morning commute. / Photo by Juhyung Lim skepped@

[Asia Economy Reporter Lim Juhyung] "120 hours of work per week? Honestly, no matter how much they pay, I don't think I can do it."

A, a worker in his 20s whom we met on the 23rd at the Gasan Digital Industrial Complex in Seoul, expressed reluctance when asked, "Can you work 120 hours a week?".

Workers at the Gasan Digital Industrial Complex, which spans from Geumcheon-gu to Guro-gu, are expressing concerns about some of President-elect Yoon Suk-yeol's labor flexibility pledges.

This area, home to small and medium-sized enterprises with 5 to 50 employees, is very sensitive to changes in government labor regulations. Especially those working in the information and communication technology (IT) industry voiced worries that the corporate culture of overwork, which was common in the past, might return.

Established in 1965, the Gasan Digital Industrial Complex is now one of Korea's representative IT industrial complexes. According to Geumcheon-gu, the total area is close to 600,000 pyeong (approximately 1.98 million square meters), of which 73.9% consists of industrial facilities such as offices, factories, and logistics centers. There are 11,888 companies located here, with IT companies being the most numerous.

Unlike Pangyo and Gwanggyo Techno Valleys, which house major domestic IT conglomerates, Gasan is characterized by a large number of small-scale companies, and the industrial sectors are very diverse, ranging from IT outsourcing to content creation.

A, who works with editing software at a content company here, said he is already accustomed to overtime work. He said, "In places like ours with fewer than 10 employees, overtime is considered routine. Since we can't always secure work orders, we accept every request that comes in, and to meet deadlines, we inevitably have to work overtime."

Currently, the legal working hours under the Labor Standards Act are a maximum of 8 hours per day and 40 hours per week. Additionally, overtime work is limited to a maximum of 12 hours per week, making the total maximum working hours 52 hours per week. However, there are exceptions for small businesses: companies with fewer than 5 employees are not subject to the 52-hour weekly limit, and small businesses with 5 to fewer than 30 employees are allowed an additional 8 hours per week, making a total of 60 hours per week possible.

Gasan Digital Complex is one of the leading IT industrial complexes in Korea, housing more than 11,000 companies. / Photo by Juhyung Lim skepped@

A recalled, "When things were really busy, I think I worked 60 hours a week. Working more than 10 hours a day was standard, and sometimes I voluntarily gave up weekends to work. There were many times I went home without even washing up and just slept, yet I was always sleep-deprived."

He added, "Even if a person works 60 hours a week, their body can't endure it for long, so 120 hours is out of the question. I think whoever said that has never done overtime."

The controversy over '120-hour workweeks' arose last July when Yoon, then a presidential candidate for the People Power Party, gave an interview to a media outlet. At that time, Yoon criticized the Moon Jae-in administration's '52-hour workweek system,' stating, "The current government claims that the 52-hour workweek creates jobs, but statistics show the job growth rate is only 0.1%. It's a failed policy."

He added, "When I met startup youths, they complained that exceptions should be made to the 52-hour workweek system so that workers can agree on or choose their conditions. They said that to develop a single game, they need to work intensely for 120 hours a week, not just 52, and then be able to rest freely afterward." Although Yoon did not directly propose allowing '120-hour workweeks,' some workers are concerned that the next government might abolish limits on working hours.

B, in his 40s, who has experience working at a mobile game development company in the early 2000s, expressed anxiety, saying, "Of course, they won't really allow 120-hour workweeks, but if the government suddenly deregulates working hours, the 'crunch' culture (intense overtime work near game development deadlines) might return."

He said, "Just 10 years ago, the game industry, regardless of company size, practiced crunch. Many developers suffered health problems and had to take medical leave or quit. I understand that with the gradual improvement of the Labor Standards Act, this is disappearing starting from large companies to mid-sized ones, but I'm worried that this improvement in corporate work culture might be reversed."

In fact, the crunch culture, a common overwork practice in the game industry, has shown signs of improvement since the 52-hour workweek system was fully implemented in small and medium-sized enterprises (with 50 to fewer than 300 employees) in 2020.

According to the '2021 Survey on Labor Environment of Game Industry Workers' released by the Korea Creative Content Agency at the end of last year, the proportion of game developers reporting experiencing crunch decreased from 60.6% in 2019 to 23.7% in 2020, and further to 15.4% last year.

President-elect Yoon Seok-yeol's labor pledge focused on labor time flexibility, including extending the settlement period for the selective working hours system and adding targets subject to special extended work. / Photo by Asia Economy DB

Currently, President-elect Yoon's labor pledges do not specifically mention increasing the legal working hours. However, the next government appears to be considering measures such as flexibilizing fixed working hours or allowing additional working hours for users in special situations like startups.

Looking at Yoon's presidential pledges, there is a proposal to significantly extend the settlement period of the 'selective working hours system,' which deems compliance with the law if the average weekly working hours are within 40 hours (52 hours including overtime) over a certain period, from the current 1 to 3 months to 1 year. The settlement period was originally 1 month but was expanded to 3 months with the 2020 amendment to the Labor Standards Act.

There is also a plan to include new startups in the 'special extended work' category, which allows exceeding the 52-hour weekly limit under specific circumstances.

In other words, even if the total working hours do not dramatically increase, 'flexible work' that significantly increases working hours during periods of labor shortage is likely to become widespread.

Experts warn that simply relaxing the current legal working hour limits could worsen long-hour illegal labor practices and suggest the need for measures to prevent this.

Park Sung-woo, a labor attorney at Workplace Bullying 119, pointed out, "In Korea, where illegal overtime and forced unpaid labor still prevail, calling the 52-hour weekly limit excessive regulation shows a lack of understanding of reality."

Park explained that the reason illegal overtime practices persist in Korea is due to the 'comprehensive wage system,' which pays a fixed basic salary and allowances regardless of overtime, night, or holiday work hours. Because the same wage is paid regardless of actual overtime hours, employers have no incentive to reduce employees' working hours.

He emphasized, "The next government's labor policy risks damaging and reversing the social atmosphere of reducing working hours built over the past few years. Labor policy should start not with abolishing or relaxing the 52-hour weekly limit but with abolishing the comprehensive wage system that enables long-hour illegal labor."

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