▲ Vice Minister of Employment and Labor Kwon Chang-jun speaks at the '26th Employment Equality Emphasis Period Ceremony' held at the Peace & Park in the War Memorial of Korea in Seoul on May 28.
Kwon Chang-jun, Vice Minister of Employment and Labor, convened an emergency meeting on the employment situation on June 12, gathering the Ministry's Director General for Employment Policy and the heads of seven regional employment and labor offices.
Minister Kim Young-hoon, who is currently on an overseas business trip, issued an urgent directive for the meeting yesterday after reviewing the employment trends report released by the National Data Agency.
According to the National Data Agency, the number of employed people aged 15 and older last month stood at 29.12 million, a decrease of 40,000 compared to the same month last year.
This marks the first year-on-year decline in 17 months.
In particular, as factors such as rising raw material prices due to the Middle East war have accumulated, the number of employed people in the manufacturing sector plummeted by 140,000, and those in the construction sector fell by 40,000.
The number of employed youth (aged 15–29) also decreased by 255,000 compared to a year ago.
In his opening remarks, Vice Minister Kwon urged the regional heads, saying, "If necessary, please visit the sites in person," and added, "Please examine the details closely by industry and region, such as the extent of the impact on construction sites."
He emphasized, "Thorough inspections are necessary to ensure that support is provided to vulnerable areas that are affected by economic conditions first, such as subcontractors."
Vice Minister Kwon stated, "It is difficult to predict when the employment situation will recover," and added, "We will actively provide guidance on utilizing employment retention subsidies to affected companies in sectors like manufacturing so that temporary economic fluctuations do not lead to an employment crisis."
The Ministry of Employment and Labor plans to communicate with local governments and industry associations to actively consider designating additional regions for proactive response to employment crises or designating specific industries as special employment crisis sectors.
(Photo: Courtesy of the Ministry of Employment and Labor, Yonhap News)
※ Please note: This article was translated by AI and may contain errors.