Booyoung Group to reward employees with 100 million won for having children

Booyoung Group Chairman Lee Dae-geun (front row, center) presents a childbirth subsidy to a multi-generational family during a ceremony at the Booyoung Building in Jung-gu, Seoul, on Friday morning. Yonhap

Booyoung Group announced that it will pay 100 million won in cash to employees who have children born after 2021. This is the first time that a private company offers such a huge incentive of 100 million won to improve the country’s low birthrate.

At a kick-off meeting for the year held at the group's headquarters in Seoul on February 5, Chairman Lee Joong-keun announced that the company will provide 100 million won in cash for each child of 70 employees born after 2021. According to this decision, the total amount of support is 7 billion won.

Lee said, "We will continue to operate this policy in the future. If land is provided by the government, we will allow families of executives and employees who give birth to three children to choose between childbirth incentives for three babies or a permanent rental house.” He added, "Korea will face a crisis of national existence in 20 years if the birth rate continues to decline at the current rate. The economic burden of raising children and the difficulty of balancing work and family life are major reasons for the low birthrate, so we have introduced the unconventional incentive program."

In addition to the incentive program, the company is also operating a welfare program providing children's college tuition, medical expenses for immediate family members, and so on.

Lee also proposed a tax exemption system for donations to birth incentives, which he has envisioned so far. If an individual or corporation donates up to 100 million won within three years to a baby born after January 1, 2021, the amount of support will be tax-free, and the donor will also receive an income and corporate tax credit for the amount of the donation. "If such a system is supported, I believe that individuals and companies can voluntarily participate and overcome the birthrate crisis like a 'gold-collecting movement’ during the IMF crisis in the past," Lee said.

Lee, who has been in the rental housing business for more than 50 years, said, "The current private rental housing system is problematic in that it is a rental housing system awaiting sale that combines the nature of rental and sale, and there are limits to the housing stability for ordinary people without houses, such as defect problems ahead of the conversion to sale."

He argued that the percentage of the housing market should be reorganized into 30 percent of permanent rental housing and 70 percent of owned housing by involving the private sector in the construction of permanent rental housing only to solve the problems of housing insecurity and defect conflicts.

※This article has undergone review by a professional translator after being translated by an AI translation tool.