"They don't check if a regular person pretends to be an employee and uses a meal ticket. Selling 5 tickets as a bundle."

With inflation running high, more members of the public are using cafeterias at major public institutions such as the National Assembly and libraries, and meal tickets for these public institution cafeterias are actively being traded on secondhand transaction platforms.

On January 16, several posts were found on a secondhand platform offering to sell meal tickets in bulk for various public institutions and company cafeterias. Listings included 10 meal tickets for the National Library of Korea, each worth 5,000 won, being sold for 30,000 won, as well as meal tickets for the cafeterias of the Public Procurement Service, tax offices, and district offices.

Public institution meal tickets are being traded on a secondhand transaction platform. Carrot capture

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Sellers can dispose of meal tickets for cafeterias they no longer use, while buyers can save on living expenses since cafeteria meals are cheaper than eating out at regular restaurants. Some sellers highlight the advantage that employee meal tickets, which are sold at an internal discount, are cheaper than regular meal tickets. On the secondhand platform Carrot, there was a post selling National Assembly Library employee meal tickets in bundles of 10 for 4,800 won each. When inquiring with the seller, the response was that there are no special verification procedures or crackdowns for using employee meal tickets at the cafeteria, so it should be fine. However, a few days later, the post was sanctioned for "trading government-supported goods."

Carrot restricts the secondhand trading of employee meal tickets for the National Assembly cafeteria only. An official from the National Assembly Secretariat stated, "We requested Carrot to restrict these transactions because selling employee meal tickets, which are provided to staff at a discounted rate, to the general public could undermine the welfare purpose for employees. There is no regulation that directly prohibits such transactions, but we requested the restriction because the act does not align with the intended purpose."

Lee Unghyuk, a professor in the Department of Police Science at Konkuk University, explained, "Meal tickets issued to public institution employees are their personal property, so it is their freedom to sell them if they do not use them. However, if someone sells meal tickets and then obtains new ones again for use, this results in personal gain at the expense of government funds, which could constitute obstruction of business or embezzlement."