The government and the Democratic Party of Korea are pushing to create a "future response fund" that would use the additional tax revenue generated by the semiconductor boom to secure future growth engines and address polarization. They also decided to expand support for power, land, and permits to back AI (artificial intelligence) data centers and the semiconductor industry.
The Democratic Party of Korea, the government, and the presidential office held a high-level party-government meeting on the 5th at the prime minister's residence in Samcheong-dong, Seoul, to discuss creating the future response fund and ways to push the three mega projects.
Kang Jun-hyun, the Democratic Party chief spokesperson, said at a briefing, "We agreed with the government's stance to use the additional tax revenue for future generations, Korea's growth engines, and responses to polarization," adding, "The party, government, and presidential office will work closely together."
However, specifics such as the fund's size and how it will be managed will be discussed later.
Kang said, "In the meeting, regarding the future response fund, the government talked only about the purpose and direction," adding, "The details will be discussed later by the party, government, and presidential office, and no detailed roadmap or concrete plan was discussed."
He added, "(The government) did not use the term excess tax revenue but said additional tax revenue," noting, "It is tax revenue that occurred additionally, and it seems the Ministry of Planning and Budget concluded that 'additional' is the right term."
The party and government also agreed to concentrate national capacity on pushing the "three mega projects" for balanced regional development.
First, to ensure that building AI data centers proceeds without a hitch, they will fully support power, land, and permits, and they will preemptively expand power infrastructure to meet large-scale power demand from semiconductor plants and AI data centers. They also plan to build a multi-source water system to improve the stability of water supply.
They also plan to develop a corporate high-tech city that combines production, research and development, and housing functions so that corporations' semiconductor investment plans in the southwest region can translate into regional growth, and to foster the southwest region as a second semiconductor production base.
Kang said, "We also decided to work on formulating the necessary policies and securing budgets to establish settlement conditions such as housing, culture, education, and medical services," adding, "As the party has decided to launch a task force to support the three mega projects, we will actively back necessary follow-up measures, including helping related bills pass."
Along with this, the party and government decided to select priority bills to push in the third quarter and to swiftly coordinate bills with no inter-ministerial disagreements, joining forces to expedite handling of economy and livelihood-related bills.
Kang said, "There are nearly 200 bills pending in the plenary session, the National Assembly's Legislation and Judiciary Committee, and standing committees," adding, "We agreed to focus on handling economy and livelihood-related bills before the regular session of the National Assembly."