Korea pushes to raise cap on maximum weekly work hours

• Published date: 06 March 2023
• Publication title: The Korea Times

The pro-business Yoon Suk Yeol administration seeks to extend a mandatory 52-hour cap on the workweek, introduced by the previous Moon Jae-in government, following long-standing complaints raised by employers over what they claim is a lack of flexibility of working hours and difficulties in meeting deadlines.

The core of the revised measures announced by the government, Monday, is to enable companies to increase the maximum weekly work hours to 69 and allow workers to take longer vacations.

While business circles welcomed the announcement, the government's move to overhaul the workweek system is expected to face resistance due to objections from opposition parties as well as labor groups.

The government announced the measures after a meeting presided over by Finance Minister Choo Kyung-ho.

The existing workweek system was introduced in 2018 by the liberal president at the time to reduce the maximum work hours from 68 hours to 52 per week ? 40 regular hours with 12 hours of possible overtime.

Businesses have complained that there were no sufficient guidelines customizable to each industry, although the characteristics of each differ. Under the existing system, employers face criminal punishment if even one employee works for one more hour than the mandatory 52 hours a week.

The government concluded that managing overtime solely on a weekly basis has been irrational and decided to allow companies to manage extra work hours also on a monthly, quarterly, semiannual or yearly basis.

This will extend the maximum weekly work hours to 69, according to the government, enabling employees to choose more hours during weeks with heavy workloads and fewer hours during weeks with less work.

In a bid to guarantee long vacations, such as a one-month holiday, the government decided to introduce the so-called "working hours savings system," so employees can save vacations created from their overtime work and combine them with their annual holidays.

The government also decided to create more options for break times. Under the existing...