5 Work Day System Will Be Partially Implemented from Next July

The government`s plan for the 5 work-day system to apply the new system from large business (over 1000 employees) in the public and financial areas from July, 2002, was decided.

The Ministry of Labor decided the revised bill, after the Tripartite Committee had failed to reach an agreement on this issue.

The Ministry will report the revised bill to President and submit the bill to the extraordinary session of the National Assembly in next February after the readjustment among the related departments. However, the final form of this bill cannot be expected because both the management and the labor sides are protesting against the bill all together.

The government plans to implement gradually the new system from the large business of public and financial areas in July next year, business over 300 employees in July 2004, business over 10 in January 2007, and to the business up to 10 in January 2010.

In addition, prior to the implementation of the new system in the public area, government officials will take the off-days once a month on Saturday from March next year, and the elementary and secondary schools will follow it from March 2003. And from March 2004, the off-days will increase to 2 days a month and the new system will be implemented overall from 2005.

The government bill canceled the monthly leave, which is one day per a month, and laborers employed over a year have 18 days annual leave, which will increase one day every three years up to 22 days maximum. Current annual leave is 10-20 days.

The government plan also extended the maximum hour of the extra work from current 12 hours per week to 16 hours (for 3 years from now) and the extra charge for the extended 4 hours is 25 percent to the basic payment. The period of the application of the flexible labor hour system, which allow the extended work over the legal labor hours, will also be extended up to 1 year from current 1 month.

Sundays and Maternity leaves will not be paid but if female laborer wants to have a maternity leave, it must be accepted. An appendix is included for the preservation of the wage but the wage preservation is only applied to the labor hours in Saturdays (4 hours) and Sundays (8 hours).

Jin Lee leej@donga.com