Labor Hours Reduced by Labor-Management Agreement, but Should Employers Take Responsibility? ... Busan Taxi Association Chairman Launches Solo Protest

Jang Seong-ho, chairman of the Busan Taxi Transportation Business Association, is holding a solo protest in front of the Busan courthouse on the 12th.

[Asia Economy Yeongnam Reporting Headquarters, Reporter Kim Yong-woo] “The taxi industry is dead one way or another. This is the reduced prescribed working hours requested by the drivers themselves, so I cannot understand why taxi companies are being held responsible.”

On the 12th, Jang Seong-ho, chairman of the Busan City Taxi Transportation Business Association, was holding a one-person protest in front of the Busan High Court with four placards.

Prior to this, the association had issued a statement urging, “The court should respect the agreement between taxi labor and management that reflects reality,” and had been conducting relay protests in front of the court.

Leaving aside the COVID-19 pandemic that directly struck the taxi industry, the reason taxi industry representatives are confronting the court stems from the Supreme Court plenary session ruling on April 18, 2019.

When the Minimum Wage Act was applied to the taxi industry on July 1, 2009, driver employees, concerned about an increase in the standard transportation income, requested a reduction in prescribed working hours.

Accordingly, the taxi industry in the Busan area shortened the prescribed working hours by one hour through labor-management negotiations four years after the Minimum Wage Act was implemented.

However, in the case of a taxi company in Gyeonggi Province, upon the implementation of the Minimum Wage Act, the company revised employment rules to reduce prescribed working hours by 4 hours over three months. As a result, on April 18, 2019, the Supreme Court plenary session ruled that excessive reduction of prescribed working hours was invalid as it was intended to evade the Minimum Wage Act.

Following this plenary session ruling, existing collective bargaining agreements between taxi labor and management were invalidated, and many transportation workers, including retirees, filed subsequent lawsuits, plunging the nationwide taxi industry into severe confusion.

The so-called tsunami litigation crisis led to over 1,300 lawsuits nationwide, with wage claims reportedly reaching 1 trillion won.

However, even after the Supreme Court ruling, lower courts in various regions issued judgments reflecting the actual circumstances of taxi labor and management, resulting in a mixed pattern of wins and losses.

The taxi corporations argue that once transportation workers are assigned taxi vehicles, their business activities proceed under their independent judgment, beyond the scope of workplace management and supervision.

Individual transportation workers have autonomously distinguished and utilized parts of their dispatch time as working or rest time based on their own will and judgment.

Due to the nature of the taxi industry’s work form, working hours, waiting time, and rest time are not clearly distinguished, so the prescribed working hours agreed upon in collective bargaining under the Labor Standards Act have been applied as the wage payment standard hours.

Because of this, taxi companies had to raise the base pay to comply with the minimum wage, but faced opposition from workers against the base pay increase, leading to the reduction of prescribed working hours.

Chairman Jang Seong-ho said, “At the time, reducing prescribed working hours was the only option that could realistically reflect the interests of both taxi labor and management, and such legitimacy had been recognized through several lower courts, including the Seoul High Court.”

However, the reality of corporate taxis changed after the Supreme Court plenary session ruling on April 18, 2019.

A taxi association official pointed out, “The Supreme Court’s decision at that time ignored the reality and concerns of corporate taxi labor and management, who were in extremely difficult situations, and did not consider the industry’s payment capacity at all.”

Chairman Jang said, “Judging that corporate taxis no longer have a place to stand, taxi business stakeholders are currently conducting voluntary relay one-person protests in front of the Supreme Court,” and added, “Stakeholders from 1,657 business sites nationwide will simultaneously hold one-person protests in front of major courts across the country to ensure the voice of the corporate taxi industry is heard.”

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