Koo Yun-cheol, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Strategy and Finance, said on the 7th that the government will make every effort, through active macroeconomic policies such as boosting aggregate demand, to restore livelihoods and reinvigorate the real economy for vulnerable groups such as small merchants and the self-employed.
Koo, the deputy prime minister, attended the ruling-opposition policy consultation on the economic growth strategy held at the National Assembly Members' Office Building on the morning of the same day and said, "The growth rate in the third quarter of last year hit a record high for the first time in 15 quarters, and the KOSPI also surpassed 4,000 points and broke through 4,500 points yesterday," adding, "Warmth is gradually spreading to the real economy as well, and in the new year, growth is expected to expand further on the back of strong semiconductor exports and a stronger recovery in domestic demand." He also said, "We will focus on nurturing national strategic industries such as semiconductors, defense, bio, and K-culture, and we will accelerate a hyper-innovation economy through AX (AI transformation) and GX (green transformation) to ensure a rebound in the potential growth rate."
Han Jeong-ae, the Democratic Party of Korea's policy committee chair, responded, "We will also review and discuss detailed matters such as improving government procurement projects that can actively support the growth of corporations, concrete proposals to foster national strategic industries, improvements to the retirement pension system, and ways to use public data."
At the ruling-opposition consultation that day, discussions were held on the new year's economic growth strategy that the government plans to announce soon. After the consultation, Han met with reporters and said, "To revitalize the economy, the party asked the government to prepare bold and concrete growth strategies," and added, "We prepared measures to expand demand for local dwellings and requested support measures for victims of jeonse fraud."
She went on, "We decided to swiftly prepare the basic plan to strengthen the competitiveness of the semiconductor industry under the special law on the semiconductor industry passed last year, to back a leap to the world's No. 2 in semiconductors," adding, "We asked for measures to invigorate productive finance, including promoting long-term investment in domestic stocks."
The policy to convert retirement pensions into a fund system also appears likely to be announced in January. Han said, "We are conducting a study on the fund-type retirement pension, and we plan to hold separate working-level and high-level party-government meetings in January," adding, "I said it would be good to prepare with a sense of speed."