(Pension Future Forum Commentary on a Press Report) “Ruling Party Pension Committee Discusses Applying ‘More for the Lower, Less for the Upper’ to the Basic Pension… ‘Sufficient Safeguards Must Be Put in Place’” (2026.08.12.)
[The Pension Future Forum
hereby states that the following article
is plainly a false report!
Saying that “a report was received from
the advisory committee members
recommended by the Democratic Party” would be
the accurate way to put it!
The position of advisory committee members
of a particular leaning
is being conveyed, wrongly,
as the position
of the entire advisory committee.
Mentioned in that article is
the chair of the Democratic Party’s Special Committee on Pension Reform,
who is
Nam In-soon, Deputy Speaker of the National Assembly —
and Nam has already,
on pension matters,
made statements at odds with the facts!
That Germany and Japan
have provisions guaranteeing pension payment
has been stressed on several occasions — that is why.
(On matters related to this,
in the Pension Future Forum’s
Expert Columns category
there is posted
the 2013 Korea Economic Daily
head-to-head debate between National Assembly member Nam Yun In-soon and
Yoon Seok-myung, head of the Pension Research Center at the Korea Institute for Health and Social Affairs;
that debate
we ask readers to consult.)
Thus,
if the claims of Deputy Speaker Nam In-soon,
who has gone on referring to content
at odds with the facts,
exerted
a large influence on the “writing into statute of a State
guarantee of National Pension payment” included in the
March 20, 2025 amendment
of the National Pension Act,
then
a corresponding
historical responsibility must be borne —
as would be only right!
Since the beginning of this year,
the reason the discussion of Basic Pension reform
gathered momentum was this:
unlike the later-life elderly
aged 80 and over,
among the baby-boom generation newly entering
age 65,
a considerable number
belong to a group that is economically comfortable —
and on the basis of that shared understanding in our society,
there was,
at least, a shared sense that for new entrants
a new Basic Pension eligibility criterion
appeared to be needed.
That was the reason.
And yet, if the press report is true that
the chair of the ruling party’s Special Committee on Pension Reform — not the opposition’s —
said that “protection for existing beneficiaries and fairness toward new beneficiaries must be considered together,”
if that report is true,
then this,
in relation to Basic Pension reform,
differs considerably
from the direction of institutional reform
that has been discussed until now,
in terms of the direction of reform it implies,
and carries so different a nuance
that, on that account,
a pension reform in the true sense,
one able to soothe the discontent
of the younger generation and of future generations,
looks hard to achieve!
On this problem raised
by the Pension Future Forum,
we demand from the Democratic Party’s
Special Committee on Pension Reform
a public statement of position
or
a public explanation!]
(Along with the related article,
captured press report content is also attached.)
