The Saenuri Party is trying to reform the government employees pension, but they have hit a brick wall from the start. A policy debate which was schedule to be held at the National Assembly on Monday was canceled due to the physical resistance from government officials. Members of the Korean Government Employees' Union and other members of a "Joint Headquarters Against Retrogressive Changes to the Government Employees Pension" shouted slogans and made a scene, blocking the debate from proceeding as planned. Regardless of the reason and the details, it is regrettable that the debate was canceled due to the collective action of a stakeholder.

However, this should not damage the significance of the reforms to the government employees pension or interrupt with the schedule for the reforms.
The Saenuri Party commissioned the Korea Pension Association to conduct a study on possible reform suggestions concerning the government employees pension, and a review of these suggestions allows us to understand the reason for the government officials' strong resistance.

The results showed a system where the public officials would have to basically pay more and receive less--incumbent government employees would have to shoulder 43% more in pension payments, while receive 34% less benefits. According to the reform suggestions, the same payments and benefits as the national pension will be applied to government employees recruited after 2016, and the government will collect a maximum 3% of the receipts by the retired workers for the purpose of managing funds to help financial stability. If the government implements the suggestions made by the Korea Pension Association, the government can save compensations of up to 1.6 trillion won in 2016 and 333.8 trillion won by 2080. However, this is a plan which requires that much of a sacrifice from the government employees.

Also, we cannot just ignore the Korea Government Employees' Union's claims that the Korea Pension Association, which made the latest recommendations, is a society based on huge private financial capital, which has stressed stimulating the private pension market.
But even if we take into consideration the nature of the researching organization, this does not eliminate the need to reform the government employees pension. There is already a social consensus that the current government employees pension not only puts an unbearable burden on the state's finances, but that it is also not sustainable. Everyone knows that we need to execute extensive reforms and that we cannot leave this task in the hands of the government employees, who are the stakeholders. This problem has long gone beyond a labor-government relations issue to a national problem.
We cannot drag this issue any longer or resort to measures which pretend to be reforms. Instead of repeating actions where one side tries to push ahead with reforms while the other physically blocks these efforts, we need to listen to each other’s positions and find the middle ground in a public forum. Yesterday Joo Ho-young, Saenuri Party's chairman of the policy committee said, "We need to listen to the government employees' claims that they receive smaller wages than employees at private companies; they are partially restricted in labor's three primary rights; and the government employees pension is in a way a deferred salary," and indeed what kind of attitude we take to engage in related talks is also important. The Korea Government Employees' Union will not be able to receive the people's support if they continue to just blankly resist reforms to their pension plan no matter what their grounds may be. They should know that seeking a reasonable solution by actively engaging in discussions is their best alternative.