Skyrocketing commodity prices and decreasing welfare budgets make us sad!!

Skyrocketing commodity prices and decreasing welfare budgets make us sad!!

 

On September 30, 2009, right around the corner of the Choosuk holiday, Women’s Action for Decent Lives and Jobs (WADLJ) held 'a women's press conference to demand to increase welfare budget for 2010' in front of the Seoul KTX Station.

 

In spite of the difficult situation in which commodity prices have been rising rapidly and people's daily lives have become harder, a national holiday, Choosuk is around the corner in this year.  Recently, the press has reported that Korea is one of the leading groups that overcome the economic crisis and that we have to seek for exits to leap forward.

 

However, lives of socially vulnerable groups such as unemployed people due to this economic crisis and self-employed people who had to shut down their businesses early this year, are getting harder and harder, and further, social polarization has been getting serious.  The fresh breezes of overcoming this economic crisis have not been blown to common people.

 

Although there has no increases in net income for people, commodity prices have continued to skyrocket.  According to the 'consumers' commodity trends' researched in the past July, the prices of daily necessities have been rising including 5.7% in agricultural and livestock products, 6.9% in non-alcoholic beverage, and 5.7% in clothes and footwear compared to those in the same month of the previous year. Moreover, prices of city gas, one of public prices, rose by 9.3% from a year earlier.

 

Even if people sigh for high prices amidst the Choosuk holiday, on the past September 28, the government announced that welfare budget would rise only by 0.7% for 2010, which is directly related to people's lives. The Lee Myung Bak regime was supposed to increase welfare budget largely for people whose lives are getting harder due to the economic crisis, but it set the similar budget amount for the maintenance of the status quo since its loose policies such as its policies to reduce the taxes for rich people, the 4 major river  restoration project, and SOC. This shows that the policy stance of this regime is actually for businesses and the rich, even though it claims to support common people outwardly.

 

Accordingly, we at the WADLJ are at the forefront of calling for our demands to the government. Today, we are organizing a press conference and waging a campaign to be with people.

 

 

 

<Our demands>

 

1. Increase the budget for creating women's jobs for 2010!

- Increase the budget for creating women's jobs in the fields of child-care, education and social service!

- Create 20,000 jobs through the expansion of the facilities related child care and after-school education!

- Create 40,000 jobs through the expansion of national and public child-care facilities!  

- Create 50,000 jobs through the expansion and increase in child-care services for vulnerable classes! 

- Create 27,000 jobs through the expansion of long-term recuperation projects for the elderly!

- Create 20,000 jobs through the expansion of care services for parturient women and new born babies!

- Create 40,000 jobs for health and medical treatment related labor force such as home care workers and care assistants! 

 

2.  Expand the budget for supporting public education for 2010!

- Remit admission fees and tuition fees for high school students (budget: about 182.04 billion Won)!

- Remove parents' shares in education fees (budget: about 292.43 billion Won)! 

- Apply differential college tuition fees (budget: 340 billion Won)!