Judge's Salary After 30 Years Is Less Than a 3-Year Lawyer's - "Can't Even Turn On the Heater in an Old Building During Midwinter"

Published 01 Apr.2024 20:18(KST)

Among 68 Legal Offices, 32 Are 'Aged'
Maintenance Budgets Halved
"Frequent Accidents Threaten Public Safety"

Due to budget shortages in the judiciary, aging courthouses nationwide have been neglected for years without facility maintenance.

According to the Supreme Court's Facility Management Office, out of 68 courthouses across the country, 32 (47%) are considered "aging courthouses" that are over 20 years old. However, the budget for courthouse maintenance has only increased by an average of 1.7% annually from 2021 to 2024. Considering that the construction cost index rose by 4.5% annually and construction labor costs increased by 6.5% during the same period, this effectively amounts to a budget cut.

The actual allocated maintenance budget compared to the judiciary's requested budget was only △58.8% in 2021 △60.4% in 2022 △52.5% in 2023, roughly half of what was needed. Due to tight finances, maintaining aging courthouses is out of the question. As of 2021, the judiciary's facility-related budget was approximately 149.8 billion KRW, a figure comparable to the facility budget of 150 billion KRW for Haman-gun, Gyeongnam, which has a population of 62,500.

[Image source=Beomryul Newspaper]

The Seoul Central District Court, the largest court in the country, cannot even turn on a heater during winter night shifts due to concerns about electrical leakage on each floor. Although the courthouse space is insufficient due to a surge in cases, plans for expansion have been delayed indefinitely. Additionally, from 2021, when the number of retiring judges exceeded 70 annually, until last year, the average annual increase rate of the court's personnel budget (1.6%) was less than half of the inflation rate (3.7%) during the same period.

During the same period, the starting salary for new lawyers at major law firms exceeded 150 million KRW, about four times the base salary of a first-year judge (38 million to 39.5 million KRW, excluding performance bonuses), exacerbating the "wage asymmetry" phenomenon. The monthly salary of a new lawyer (about 13 million KRW) even surpassed that of the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court (about 12.22 million KRW). In 2022, the judiciary's personnel expenses amounted to 1.3298 trillion KRW, increasing by only 3.5 billion KRW (0.26%) compared to the previous year.

While the personnel expense growth rate had maintained around 5% from 2016 to 2020, it sharply dropped to 1.16% in 2021 and further declined to the 0% range in 2022, shrinking by a quarter for two consecutive years. The total personnel expense increase over the three years from 2021 to 2023 was 64 billion KRW, which is less than the increase of 64.1 billion KRW in this year alone. As judges feel increasing "relative poverty," retirements have surged.

According to the Supreme Court, the number of judges who retired before reaching the mandatory retirement age rose nearly 40% from 65 in 2020 to 89 in 2021. The average number of judges taking early retirement from 2018 to 2020 was less than 60, but from 2021 to this year, an average of 78.8 judges have left the bench annually.

A chief judge at the Seoul High Court said, "A judicial research assistant recently left after a three-year contract to join a major law firm, earning a higher salary than a chief judge with 30 years of experience," adding, "As mid-level judges at district courts increasingly move to law firms, the saying 'judges value honor over money' seems to be a thing of the past."