A book has been published that redefines 'work as the meaning of life' between market logic and human dignity.
Lee Sang-heon, Director of the Employment Policy Department of the International Labour Organization (ILO), examines the essence of today's employment problems through a series titled "The Economics of Working Life."
To see beyond the numbers and find a way through the discord, we must confront head-on the challenges that Korean society must address here and now.
Having spent the past 30 years developing and advising policy at the forefront of international organizations, policymaking, and economics research, he presents an introductory book on employment that combines academic insights with practical considerations.


The first book in the series, "Why Good Jobs Are Always Scarce," goes beyond economic analysis, which provides a clear answer, and asks again about the value of "working life" that exists outside the narrow concepts of labor and employment.
The book, consisting of nine chapters, vividly depicts working life in this country based on a multi-layered awareness of the issues surrounding "good jobs" in each chapter and seeks realistic alternatives throughout.
Covering a wide range of topics, including unemployment, the social value of work, compensation or wages, minimum wage, working hours, technological change, migrant labor, and the roles of government and corporations, it fundamentally shakes up the way we view work and employment.
Drawing on various economic theories, research findings, and the latest international case studies, it offers insights that transcend the limitations of conventional economics, leading readers on a fascinating and rewarding journey as they piece together the complex puzzle before us.

The problem needs to be clarified.
It is not accurate to ask, “Why are there a shortage of jobs?”
If you go to a poor village in Africa, everyone works.
By the numbers, this is a 'full employment' situation.
If you don't work, you can't make a living, so you have to go out on the street and sell woodcrafts you made overnight.
In places where unemployment is a 'luxury', everyone has to work, and so the ridiculous situation of no shortage of jobs arises.

What's missing are 'good' jobs.
It's no different in a rich country.
There are plenty of jobs that require people to endure hardship and danger for barely enough to earn minimum wage.
It is a common daily routine, especially for young people, women, and the elderly.
So the question we need to ask is, “Why are there so few ‘good’ jobs?”
--- p.14, from “Introduction”

How does the labor market become a "market"? To put it bluntly, the definition of a market is infinitely complex. So, let's simplify it: "A market is a place where prices and transaction volumes are determined by supply and demand."
Of course, the term market does not necessarily refer to a physical space where transactions are conducted face-to-face, like a department store.
The stock market is also a market, where millions of dollars are traded across borders the moment you press a computer keyboard, and you don't know or need to know who your counterparty is.

Coming to the market in search of a job means submitting oneself to the logic of supply and demand.
I'll explain it step by step, since it's good to know.
When the price of labor (for convenience, 'wages') rises, the supply of labor increases because more people want to do more work.
If we represent this on a graph, a line is drawn that goes up to the right as the amount of labor increases along with the increase in wages.
In difficult terms, it is the labor supply curve.
However, the company's position is the opposite.
As wages rise, costs rise accordingly, so unless other conditions change, companies tend to reduce employment.
If we represent this on a graph, a line is drawn that goes down to the right, indicating that as wages rise, employment decreases.
Again, in difficult terms, it is the labor demand curve.
--- pp.31~32, from “Chapter 1, Unemployment: One Reality, Dividing Thoughts”

However, there are many forms of labor in the world that are not subject to 'trade' but are socially useful.
We don't have to look far to find it; just look at our daily lives.
Most domestic work, including care work, is crucial to human survival and well-being, but there is no explicit compensation for it.
Some people see it as a realm of sacrifice and duty.
According to the definition of employment discussed above, this type of work is not 'employment'.
But is that really the case?

Let's think about it.
There was a woman who had been caring for her sick mother at home for a while, but things became difficult when she had a child.
I had no choice but to pay a caregiver to take care of my mother.
In this case, the work of caring for the mother itself remains the same, but the ‘non-employment’ is changed to ‘employment’.
In other words, there is no change in the content of care work, but the socioeconomic perception and classification of it are different.
Now let's say that things change again when this woman's child turns one.
Let's say that he, who had been performing care work at home due to childbirth and childcare, decided to return to the workforce and hired a housekeeper for this purpose.
As a result, statistically, the number of employed people increases by two.
Although monetary economic activity has doubled, it is unclear how much social benefit this has generated.
Let's say that the housekeeper has to leave her elementary school-aged child home alone while she works, and the woman who has returned to the workforce has to pay a significant portion of her salary to the housekeeper.
The calculation of overall social benefits becomes more complex.
--- p.74, from Chapter 2, “The World of Work: Beyond Employment and Labor”

The logic of externalities also applies to jobs.
As we have seen, the impact a job has on the worker, their family, their community, and society is not adequately reflected in monetary compensation.
Even if it is reflected, it is mostly compensation for immediate and short-term impacts and does not include mid- to long-term impacts.
Current job losses have a significant and lasting impact on future jobs and income in the long term, but this is not taken into account in your paycheck.
Of course, it is not easy to estimate exactly how much difference there is between the private and social value of a job.
Measuring non-monetary aspects is difficult in itself, and their differences vary depending on personal, social, cultural, and national circumstances.
According to previous studies, approximately 85-93% of the social costs of unemployment are non-monetary costs, and only 7-15% are monetary costs (Winkelmann & Winkelmann, 1995).

What happens when the size of jobs is determined solely by market logic, without properly reflecting the social value of work? The result is a failure to reach the socially optimal level.
In other words, the labor market always has an undersupply of jobs.
To put it another way, job reductions (e.g. layoffs) are always carried out at an excessive level.
Jean Tirole, winner of the 2014 Nobel Prize in Economics, pointed out that it is precisely for this reason that market economies have a “tendency to fire workers too often” (Tirole, 2017).
If we fail to take into account the social externalities of work, we end up in a situation where we are slow and insufficient in creating jobs, but too quick in destroying them.
--- pp.94~95, from “Chapter 3, “The Value of Jobs: Social Value and Contributory Justice”

Difficulties come from other places too.
It is economic policy.
The boomerang effect of worsening distribution, as discussed above, is not reflected in conventional economic policies.
Quite the contrary, whenever there is news of a wage increase, economists and policymakers are startled.
I'm worried that prices will rise.
This is also part of the logic that worries about a 'vicious cycle of rising wages and prices'.
Moreover, those leading monetary policy today remember the stagflation of the 1970s and 1980s, a textbook example of this vicious cycle.
While they may make decisions in a complex and dazzling world of numbers, it's hard to ignore the power of memory.
“To understand a man, you must know what happened to him when he was twenty.” This is what Napoleon said, who experienced the French Revolution at the age of twenty.

Since the issues of wages and inflation are intertwined like a tangled web, each stakeholder's thoughts and judgments will vary.
It's an economic but also a political issue.
But the past few years (2022-2024), when global inflation was driven by skyrocketing energy prices following the COVID-19 pandemic, have shown that past experiences are simply the past.
--- pp.140~141, from “Chapter 4, “The Price of Work: Too High Wages, Too Low Wages”

Economic textbooks strongly argue that minimum wages have negative employment effects, but paradoxically, over the past 40 years, minimum wage systems have become more widespread in more countries.
So to speak, the 'political' popularity of the minimum wage is growing.
So, is the minimum wage a reckless own goal that politicians commit at the great cost of job losses? So, does the minimum wage actually reduce employment? As paradoxical as the situation is, so too is the answer.
Economists have diligently conducted empirical research on the theoretical "prophecies" of economics regarding the minimum wage, but the result is that it is generally difficult to find anyone who "will testify about Jesus."
In other words, there is generally little empirical evidence to support the economic prediction that the minimum wage reduces employment.

I also reviewed decades of empirical research around 2010, but the empirical evidence for the claim that minimum wages reduce employment was very weak (ILO, 2010).
The most monumental study was by David Card and Alan Kruger, who won the 2021 Nobel Prize in Economics.
They used more rigorous techniques to measure the employment effects of minimum wage changes in the late 1980s and early 1990s, and the results were striking.
The minimum wage significantly increased wages, but had no significant negative impact on employment.
There were even research results showing that employment actually increased.
There has been much debate over the results that go against the 'common sense' of the theory of supply and demand, but these conclusions have been supported by empirical research.
The book they compiled their research results in had a title that gave us a good idea of ​​what it would be about.
Myth and Measurement: The new economics of the minimum wage (Card & Krueger, 1995).
The argument is that conventional economic theory should be reduced to a 'myth' and that a 'new' economics of minimum wage is needed through accurate 'measurement' of reality.
--- pp.158~159, from “Chapter 5, “The Price of Low Work: Is the Minimum Wage a Blessing or a Mistake?”

Korea's experience is no different.
Working hours, which once reached 3,000 hours, have gradually decreased, reaching 2,228 hours in 2008 and 1,872 hours in 2023.
It was shortened by about 350 hours in 15 years.
Based on 40 hours of work, it amounts to 9 weeks, or approximately 2 months.
These changes were not a linear process that occurred naturally along with rising incomes.
Although there have been persistent complaints that statutory working hours do not adequately regulate actual working hours, actual working hours have also decreased significantly each time statutory working hours were reduced from 48 hours to 44 hours (in 1989) and then to 40 hours (in 2003) due to sociopolitical pressure.
In other words, the process of reducing working hours is more like going down a wide staircase rather than a smoothly descending escalator.
It is a scene where one takes a big step down, walks flat, and then takes a big step down again (Lee & McCann, 2011).

Although progress has been made, working hours in Korea remain relatively high.
It stands out even compared to other Asian countries (Figure 6-2).
It is still well above the OECD average and is now close to the US level.
One reason why annual working hours in Korea and the United States are similar is the lack of paid vacation.
The United States is unique in that it does not have a federal law guaranteeing paid leave.
While "good" jobs often provide paid vacation through employment contracts, many less-than-ideal jobs don't.
Although Korea guarantees paid vacation, the rate of people actually using it is low.
According to a 2024 survey, regular workers in workplaces with five or more employees were given an average of 16.6 days of annual leave, but the utilization rate was only 76%.
Although it is guaranteed by law, it is not sufficient in reality.
Even legal guarantees are not guaranteed unless you demand and seek them.
In short, nothing sums up the history of working hours more exquisitely than the verse from the Gospel of Matthew: “Ask and you will receive.”
--- pp. 188~190, from “Chapter 6, Working Time: The Dream and Frustration of Reducing Working Hours”

If jobs are becoming more differentiated or polarized due to technological change, the location of jobs should not be taken lightly.
When the waves of globalization were high, economists and policymakers only considered the secondary question of where jobs were being lost and where they were being created.
For example, if a job disappears in Michigan, USA, and a new one is created in Silicon Valley, or even moves to China, I believed that a replacement job would be created somewhere else.
In the process of globalization, there are bound to be winners and losers, but I thought it was okay if the combined gains of the winners and the losses of the losers resulted in an overall benefit.
This excessive belief in averages has led to strong backlash against globalization.

The job problem is more serious.
As I've emphasized many times, jobs aren't just numbers; they're people.
In other words, a job is a physical space formed by family, friends, community, society, etc., where a person performs a specific productive act and receives compensation for it.
Because of the ‘physicality’ of these jobs, people tend to be reluctant to move when jobs disappear from their own neighborhood or city and are replaced by new ones in cities far away (Goldstein, 2017).
This tendency is especially stronger when the social and cultural gap between regions is large.
That's why, when a city's jobs are hit hard by technological change or other factors, it often becomes a ruin filled with unemployment, tension, and violence.
In other words, the polarization of jobs leads to the polarization of regions.
As we saw in Chapter 3, this means that the social value of jobs is that great.
Therefore, while it may not be possible to completely restore jobs destroyed by technological shocks, it is necessary for cities and communities to actively create new jobs.
Jobs must be created where people are.
In short, it is important to get people to find new jobs, but it is also very important to make sure that new jobs are accessible to people.
To borrow an expression from Beveridge, the architect of the British welfare state, “Jobs, rather than men, should wait” (Beveridge, 1944).
--- pp.230~231, from Chapter 7, “Technological Change: Abundance and Shadow, Differentiated Jobs and Fragmented Workplaces”

There is a problem that needs to be addressed immediately.
Why is migrant labor increasing? The conventional economic approach is to ask, "Is it a demand factor or a supply factor?"
You might be criticized for saying, "Another obvious story," but this time, the difference is important.
To put it bluntly, the question is, "Are migrant workers pushed here or called here?" This simple question has enormous political repercussions.
If they are 'displaced people', it becomes a problem of border control and immigration management, and if they are 'call' people, it becomes a problem of acceptance and hospitality.

On one hand, it is said like this.
The number of migrant workers has increased as people from poor countries, unable to find decent jobs in their own countries, flock to our country where the pay is much better.
The policies and politics that failed to properly control this are largely responsible.
This is a typical supply-led theory.
On the other hand, it is said like this:
Both businesses and households are struggling due to the chronic labor shortage.
If we don't bring in workers from outside the country, our economy and livelihoods will become even more difficult.
We must actively utilize foreign manpower.
This is a typical demand-led theory.
--- p.253, from Chapter 8, “Labor Across Borders: Migrant Labor, Misunderstandings, and Prejudices”

Although a long time has passed, this town still remembers those days.
We remember the memories, but we also do not forget the lesson that we must not repeat the pain.
So, when the number of unemployed people started to rise recently, the town introduced a temporary program that guaranteed jobs for everyone.
This program helps people who have been unemployed for a long time to get jobs in private companies or social enterprises that provide services needed by the local community after completing an eight-week training course.
If you get a job at a private company, you will receive an employment subsidy, and in any case, your salary must be at least the minimum wage.
Most of them got jobs at social enterprises.
There is no compulsion at all.
You can only benefit from the program if you want to, and if you don't want to, you can continue to receive unemployment benefits.
It is a type of job guarantee project, and its official name is the 'Marienthal Job Guarantee Pilot Project'.
It is a name that contains both past history and present will.
All the village policies are coordinated to support this project.
The whole town rolled up its sleeves and got together to create jobs.

The office overseeing the job security program is located on the site of a former textile factory.
History and experience continue like that.
And the mayor of the village, who initiated this business, wrote his master's thesis on the historical experience of Marienthal.
His words are blunt.
“You know Adam Smith, right?
That gentleman always said the market was right.
If you don't have a job, you might say you can just work for less money, but that's completely wrong.
(…) What are you talking about when there are no jobs at all?” Smith may feel somewhat wronged by this misunderstanding, but the mayor’s will is that strong.
The town's ambitious undertakings are expected to continue for the foreseeable future.
There is a saying, “It takes a village to raise a child.”
It is believed to be an African proverb.
And in a small Austrian town called Mariental, they are raising jobs like they are raising children.

--- p.279, from “Chapter 9, “A Society Investing in Working Life”