Moon Jae-in income-led growth government (South Korea)

Doctrine — stated goals and content

Centre-left Democratic Party government elected after the impeachment of Park Geun-hye, organised around a self-described "income-led growth" (소득주도성장) doctrine that aimed to shift the Korean macro model from chaebol-led export primacy toward wage-led domestic demand. Core content: (i) rapid statutory minimum-wage escalation (16.4% increase January 2018 to KRW 7,530, followed by 10.9% January 2019 to KRW 8,350 — the two largest consecutive annual hikes in Korean history, before a deliberate pullback to ~2-3% in 2020-2022 after SME backlash); (ii) 52-hour maximum work-week phased from July 2018 for firms with 300+ employees, extended to smaller firms through 2021; (iii) public-sector hiring expansion targeting 810,000 additional public jobs over the term; (iv) property- market tightening across 20+ packages (comprehensive capital-gains tax, acquisition-tax surcharges on multi-home owners, loan-to-value caps for Seoul, and the July 2020 lease-law revision extending tenancy to four years and capping renewal rent increases at 5%) which coincided with a ~90% Seoul apartment-price surge 2017-2021; (v) inter-Korean engagement — three Moon-Kim summits 2018, Panmunjom Declaration, Pyongyang Declaration, which stalled after the 2019 Hanoi summit breakdown; (vi) nuclear phase-out posture (stopped Shin Kori 5/6 suspension referendum in 2017 ultimately resumed construction; legislated no new plants and life-extension rejections) paired with renewable expansion and the 2050 carbon-neutrality pledge; (vii) COVID-19 response — disaster relief cash transfers, Korean New Deal (KRW 160 trillion) announced 2020. Proponents frame the package as a correction of chaebol-skewed growth and social-safety-net catch-up; critics frame it as wage-cost shock to SMEs, property-price fuel, and nuclear policy incoherence.