South Korea to create more jobs especially for women and senior citizens

Owing to the higher revenue from tax collection, the South Korea government led by President Moon Jae-in has expanded the size of the job-related budget for 2019. A budget for 2019 has been set at $21.2 billion, a 22% rise from this year's $17.3 billion

According to the reports, Asia's fourth-largest economy, South Korea's added only 5,000 jobs from a year earlier. The 2019 budget proposal calls for a spending increase of about 9.7 percent from last year’s initial budget, the biggest jump since the aftermath of the global financial crisis in 2009. The ministry shared in media, “Spending to create jobs will raise a record amount, while infrastructure spending will fall.” It is also shared that the government plans to spend $1.3 million in creating jobs for women and approximately $1 billion on jobs for senior citizens.

Both the government and Bank of Korea have trimmed their forecasts for economic growth this year to 2.9 percent from 3 percent. Employment has been rising but at a slower pace. The jobless rate ticked up to 3.8 percent in July, according to Statistics Korea.

The government’s spending plan may support private consumption and will likely help mitigate any downside risks to economic growth next year, said Park Seok-gil, an economist at JPMorgan Chase & Co.