Korean Economy
Choi Gyung-hwan, the Deputy Prime Minister for Economic Affairs and the Minister of Strategy and Finance analyzed that Korean Economy has stumbled into a three-way trap of low growth, low balance, and low performance.
Deputy Prime Minister Choi commented at his inauguration ceremony held at Sejong Government Complex on July 16, “Looking at the Korean economy closely, it fell into a three-way trap.”
The Deputy Prime Minister explained that the Korean economy is currently losing its power to recover. He said, “We have tried everything to overcome low growth, but the Korean economy is still far from a real recovery. Especially after the Sewol crisis, economic demands are depressed, and so is growth potential.”
In fact, the resilience of the Korean economy is actually shrinking.
Economic professionals foresaw that the growth potential of the Korean economy will decline sharply as an economically-active population declines within two or three years. Deputy Prime Minister Choi said, “We need to come up with a new growth equation to escape from this low growth cycle, to bring an economic quantum jump as soon as possible.”
Deputy Prime Minister Choi pointed out that structural problems, including low household incomes and non-regular employment, are worsening domestic stagnation. He explained, “Low growth, low price, and excessive current account surpluses are extended, and therefore threatening the entire macroeconomy of Korea. Exports, domestic demand, households, and companies are all facing difficulties, and an unbalance of the economy is deepening.”
He also criticized the government to not be able to bring necessary and effective policies, and declared to introduce essential policies for the real economy. Deputy Prime Minister Choi pointed out, “Although there were so many policies for economic recovery, people in Korea could not feel them at all. The government will be blamed as incompetent and careless if it fails to monitor the real economy and amends relevant policies.”