Concerns over side effects of 'labor law package' to protect nonregular workers

Effective protection for nonregular workers can ultimately be secured only when it goes hand in hand with sustainable job creation.

Kim Young-hoon, the minister of employment and labor, speaks in an interview with the JoongAng Ilbo at the Government Complex Seoul on Jan. 14. [KANG JUNG-HYUN]

The administration of Lee Jae Myung is moving forward with a “labor law package” as its first major labor legislation. In an interview with the JoongAng Ilbo published on Monday, Labor Minister Kim Young-hoon said that more than eight million workers remain outside legal protection, calling it evidence that the Constitution has not functioned properly in workplaces. He said the government aims to pass the package by Labor Day, or May 1.

The initiative seeks to strengthen protections for nonregular workers, including freelancers, workers in special arrangements and platform workers. Many nonregular workers function as employees in practice but remain outside the protection of the Labor Standards Act. As a result, they often face unfair treatment regarding wages and contract terms without legal recourse and are pushed into employment insecurity. From the standpoint of strengthening labor rights, the overall policy direction is reasonable.

Reflecting this concern, the labor law package includes a “presumption of employee status,” under which all working people are presumed to be employees unless employers prove otherwise. It also introduces a “basic act for working people,” which sets minimum protections for those still not recognized as employees. The intent is to significantly lower the threshold for proving employee status and prevent unfair treatment of nonregular workers.

The issue, however, is effectiveness. Few overseas precedents exist. Many nonregular workers are also closer to self-employed contractors who provide commissioned services rather than work under direct employer control. Treating them the same as regular employees, whose working hours and tasks are broadly managed by employers, poses practical limits. Companies additionally rely on nonregular workers for structural reasons tied to business operations.

In a labor market where dismissing unsuitable workers is already difficult, presuming all working people to be employees under the Labor Standards Act and requiring employers to disprove that status would inevitably increase corporate burdens. Companies are also set to face expanded bargaining obligations with subcontractor unions under revisions to the Trade Union and Labor Relations Adjustment Act, scheduled to take effect in March.

If firms must assume that all 8.7 million nonregular workers are employees and then individually rebut that presumption, labor market rigidity could intensify further. There is also a real risk that companies may accelerate job substitution through artificial intelligence and robotics.

The government should revisit the lessons of the fixed-term workers act introduced in 2007. While intended to convert workers into regular employees after two years, it instead entrenched the practice of replacing workers every two years. A policy born of good intentions ended up increasing labor market confusion.

The government must soberly confront this reality and focus its policy capacity on creating conditions in which companies can expand employment on their own. Effective protection for nonregular workers can ultimately be secured only when it goes hand in hand with sustainable job creation.

This article was originally written in Korean and translated by a bilingual reporter with the help of generative AI tools. It was then edited by a native English-speaking editor. All AI-assisted translations are reviewed and refined by our newsroom.