Supreme Court's Ruling on '52-Hour Workweek'... "Health Rights Violated by Concentrated Work"

With the Supreme Court ruling that compliance with the 52-hour workweek should be calculated on a weekly basis rather than daily, criticism has arisen that this may have paved the way for excessive concentrated work. It is argued that this effectively allows for working in bursts, which could harm workers' health rights.

Supreme Court. Photo by Asia Economy DB

On the 26th, Shin Hana, a lawyer from Workplace Bullying 119, stated in an interview with MBC Radio’s ‘Kim Jong-bae’s Focus’ that “The Labor Standards Act imposes dual restrictions to regulate long-term labor, limiting not only the weekly working hours but also daily working hours to not exceed 8 hours. However, the recent Supreme Court ruling judged compliance based solely on whether the weekly total working hours minus 40 hours exceeded 12 hours.”

The Supreme Court, the day before, partially overturned and remanded the case of Mr. A, who was indicted for violating the Labor Standards Act and the Employee Retirement Benefit Security Act, ruling that when determining compliance with the 52-hour workweek, it is correct to sum all weekly working hours and then calculate the excess, rather than adding up daily hours exceeding 8 hours individually. For example, if a worker works 15 hours a day for three days a week, previously, working 7 hours of overtime daily totaling 21 hours was illegal, but according to the Supreme Court’s recent judgment, as long as the total weekly working hours do not exceed 45 hours or the 52-hour limit, it is considered legal.

Lawyer Shin said, “From the labor side, there is greater flexibility in working hours within a one-week period,” adding, “Therefore, concentrated work, or crunch mode, which negatively affects workers’ health, becomes possible.” She further pointed out, “If someone works 21.5 hours a day for two days in a week, the overtime is only 3 hours, so this is not problematic. This could lead to advice like ‘work overnight for two days and then rest.’ In reality, however, overnight work and overtime during those two days could damage health rights.”

Shin emphasized, “While the current Labor Standards Act imposes dual restrictions on weekly and daily working hours, there are no regulations on daily limits for overtime work. To prevent confusion in the field and protect workers’ health rights, the National Assembly needs to promptly undertake legislative supplementation.”

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