Seoul Mayor Oh Se-hoon's 'Safe Income Pilot Project' Completes Selection of 500 Households... First Payment on 11th, 5-Year 'Income Security Policy Experiment'

Mayor Oh Se-hoon Attends Inauguration Ceremony on the 4th
Single-Person Households 40%, Ages 40-64 50% Most Common... 41% of Households Not Receiving Current Welfare Benefits
31 'Research Advisory Group' Members Appointed Including Participating Citizens, Welfare, Economy, and Statistics Scholars Domestically and Abroad

[Asia Economy Reporter Lim Cheol-young] The Seoul Metropolitan Government has completed the selection of 500 households to participate in the ‘Safe Income Pilot Project,’ a future welfare model by Mayor Oh Se-hoon aimed at ‘walking together with the vulnerable,’ and will officially launch the five-year pilot project starting with the first payment on the 11th.

On the 4th, Mayor Oh Se-hoon held a launch ceremony at Seoul City Hall to mark the start of the ‘Safe Income Pilot Project’ and pledged to create an attractive Seoul that walks together with the vulnerable. The Safe Income Pilot Project is a progressive income guarantee system that supports ‘more for those with less income’ to ensure a dignified life beyond minimum livelihood support. It targets those earning 85% or less of the median income and pays half of the difference between the 85% median income benchmark and the household income as safe income.

Seoul plans to select 500 households with incomes below 50% of the median income as the pilot support group (with 1,023 comparison households) in the first phase this year, and in the second phase next year, add 300 households with incomes between 50% and 85% of the median income (with about 600 comparison households), expanding to 800 households (with 1,600 comparison households).

At the launch ceremony, about 250 citizens from the 500 households selected for the Safe Income Pilot Project attended and signed agreements consenting to participate in the project. Following this, Mayor Oh awarded appointment letters to various experts participating in the ‘Safe Income Pilot Project Research Advisory Group,’ which will conduct research on the pilot project over five years. The advisory group includes 24 domestic advisors as well as seven international advisors, including Professor J?rgen Schupp from the German Institute for Economic Research, who leads income experiments in Germany, and Professor Stacia Martin West, director of the Income Security Research Center at the University of Pennsylvania, who oversees income experiments in U.S. cities.

Among the 500 households receiving safe income support for three years, single-person households accounted for the largest share at 40% (200 households). By age group, those aged 40-64 made up the largest portion at 50%. By gender of the household head, males accounted for 49% (245 people) and females 51% (255 people).

Among the 500 households, 34.4% were currently receiving basic livelihood benefits (living, medical, housing, education), and 24.4% belonged to the near-poverty class. Non-beneficiary households not receiving current welfare benefits accounted for 41.2% (206 households). By district, Jungnang-gu had 38 households (7.6%), Gangseo-gu 37 households (7.4%), and Eunpyeong-gu 31 households (6.2%), showing that the number of households and the proportion of basic livelihood recipients were generally similar across districts.

Seoul is promoting the ‘Safe Income Pilot Project’ as an ‘income security policy experiment’ to research a future welfare system that will serve as a public safety net, as it is a new attempt to change the framework of welfare. Over the next five years, the city plans to conduct in-depth research on what welfare system is suitable for Korean society through effect analysis of the safe income system and comparative studies with existing welfare programs. The ‘Safe Income Pilot Project Research Advisory Group’ appointed on this day will be responsible for co-authoring research reports and providing advice throughout this process.

Additionally, the city will regularly hold forums to discuss the new income security system, ensuring objective and credible research. In fact, Seoul conducted a baseline survey on the second selection group of the Safe Income Pilot Project from May to June and plans to hold the ‘Seoul Income Security International Forum’ around November to share research results and discuss with domestic and international scholars.

The city will also focus on building an international cooperation system for the development of income security systems centered on the ‘Safe Income Pilot Project Research Advisory Group.’ In the short term, regular academic meetings will be held with research institutions conducting income experiments in Germany and the U.S. and scholars from the advisory group. In the long term, the plan is to strengthen this into a tentative ‘Global Income Security Network’ involving cities, research institutions, and scholars conducting or interested in income security experiments, such as Berlin and LA. The goal is to share multilateral experiences through annual general meetings, information exchange, research cooperation, and joint academic presentations, and to work together globally on creating new systems.

Mayor Oh said, “We are starting the ‘Safe Income Pilot Project,’ a new welfare system to solve the biggest problems in our society today: the inheritance of wealth disparity and deepening polarization. We will meticulously verify the potential of the Safe Income Pilot Project to determine what future welfare system can allow all Seoul citizens to maintain their dignity and dream of hope for tomorrow without anyone being left behind.”

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