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Centre for Policy on Ageing | |
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| Inadequate policy or operational failure? The potential crisis of the Korean National Pension Programme | | Author(s) | Huck-ju Kwon |
| Journal title | Social Policy and Administration, vol 33, no 1, March 1999 |
| Pages | pp 20-38 |
| Keywords | Pensions ; Social welfare ; Social policy ; Korea. |
| Annotation | It is argued that the Korean welfare state, created in the era of economic development, is transient in nature, and that it needs a major reform not only to contain the cost but also to meet the growing demand for social welfare. The Korean National Pension Programme was introduced in 1988; by 1994, it included 26.8% of the economically active population and had accumulated a pension fund equal to 24% of government expenditure. Even so, without major reform, the Programme is likely to face financial crisis. This paper asks whether the crisis will arise due to inadequate policy design, or to operational failure. The latter cause may require the Pension Fund to be privatised to operate more efficiently, while the former would demand rectifying policy design defects. This study argues that the crisis is strongly related to inadequate policy design, promising generous pensions while at the same time requiring only a small amount in contributions; there have also been operational inefficiencies in running the Programme. Inadequacy in policy design stemmed from developmentalism embedded in the Korean welfare state, which regards the National Pension Programme mainly as a measure for mobilising cheap capital. (KJ/RH). |
| Accession Number | CPA-990301205 A |
| Classmark | JJ: TY: TM2: 7DK |
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