The People’s Power party has announced its intention to include a “4.5-day workweek” as a campaign promise for the upcoming presidential election on June 3rd, and pursue it actively. In response, the Democratic Party criticized this proposal, calling it a “sweet talk that deceives the people” since they had previously suggested a four-day workweek.
Kwon Young-se, chairman of the emergency response committee for the People’s Power party, stated during a party meeting at the National Assembly that they are considering various ways to reflect the benefits of a 4.5-day workweek in the presidential election pledge, while maintaining the legal 40-hour workweek through a flexible work schedule. He emphasized that any introduction of flexible work hours must be accompanied by improvements in productivity and efficiency and expressed their intention to abolish the current 52-hour workweek limitation.
The 4.5-day week proposed by the People’s Power party involves extending the normal work hours by one extra hour from Monday to Thursday, allowing employees to leave after working just four hours on Friday. The Democratic Party, on the other hand, plans to shorten weekly working hours and apply more flexibility in allowing exceptions to the 52-hour workweek limit according to industry needs.
Lee Jae-myung, during a National Assembly negotiation group speech, suggested that advances in technology should lead to reduced working hours. The Democratic Party criticized the People’s Power’s proposal as a “blindfolded approach,” arguing that such changes are already possible under current labor laws with mutual agreement between employers and employees. They also questioned how additional pay for extra work hours would be handled and warned against any attempts to deny workers their rights to supplemental pay, labeling it as a backward-thinking approach.
The 4-day workweek was a key pledge in the Democratic Party’s recent presidential and general elections. Lee Jae-myung emphasized during his February speech that the age of advanced technology, symbolized by artificial intelligence, should fundamentally change traditional labor concepts and welfare systems, advocating for productivity gains from AI and technology to translate into shorter working hours. The Democratic Party has also identified the 4-day workweek as a crucial livelihood-focused issue.
Previously, the People’s Power party criticized the proposal as populist, with Kim Moon-soo, the then Minister of Employment and Labor, cautioning that it might exacerbate economic hardships and lead to many closures and bankruptcies. Yeouido Institute Director Yoon Hee-sook, in a radio interview, argued that companies should be able to agree internally on such work arrangements and questioned whether businesses that operate only four days a week could survive.