In case of the payment for the unemployed, only the workers whose working place has more than 30 workers can be benefitted. In case of the development programme and stabilty project, the workers working at the place with more than 70 workers can be benefitted. It means that those who are recently employed at the age of over 60, part time workers, daily workers, seasonal or temporary workers, government servants, teachers of private schools, etc. are out of its category.

In regard with the new institution, leading women's organizations have pointed out that the new institution, in fact, excludes women workers of its benefits:

1. Looking throughout the statistics, 4.2million women workers, which is 62.7% of total 6.7 million women workers, work at the place with less than 5 workers, 7.8% of them work with 5 - 10 workers, 5.7% of them work with 10-19 workers, and 7.9% of them work with 20 -50 workers.

   The statistics cannot show the exact percentage of the women workers who can be benefitted by the new institution. Approximately 76.2 - 84.1% of women workers are excluded from the benefits. In regard with the development programme and stability project of employment, about 84.1 - 89.4% of women workers are excluded. Moreover, the percentage of the benefit is less with consideration of part time and temporary workers.

   Only about 10% of women workers are able to be the benefiters.(According to the statistics made by Korea Women Development Institute of 1994; the percentage of part time workers is 8.4%, of temporary workers is 14.6%, and of daily workers is 10.3 of women workers in 1993)

2. There is a serious gap of unemployment payment between men and women. The unemployment payment is composed of 'basic payment' and 'the payment for promoting employment' in the light of aiming towards stabilization of the unemployed's life and promotion for re employment.

   The basic payment is paid based upon the former payment under the fixed rate system. At present of 1993, women workers received 54.6% of men workers' payment. It means, the women workers receive much lower basic payment. The more crucial problem is that most women workers can hardly get the judgement of being un- employed and of economic activities.

   In order to be acknowledged as an unemployed worker ,which is a ticket for getting the unemployment payment, the unemployed worker should enroll at the job security organization right after losing her/his job, apply for finding a new job, and present to the managing department once for two weeks in order to prove that he/she is trying to get a job. The applicant should not refuse to attend to the job training programme, which is recommended by the maneging department, or to accept the recommended new job.

   They are for paying unemployment payment only to those who have sincere and active attitude for looking for a new job. The regulation states that those who quitted job for private reason cannot get the payment. The problem is that the judgement of if the worker loses job by oneself or forced by the company can be decided by the job security organization.

   In Korea there still exists that,in case of marriage, pregnancy, and childbirth, most women workers are recommended to quit the job and sometimes appointed to move to a new sector or new place where is very far a way from her living place. In this case, many of them give up clinging to her job. Therefore it is very hard to judge whether she just quit the job or is fired. Moreover the final judgement is in the hand of the chief of job security agency. It means the judgement can be made very personally and also depends upon the chief's understanding of women.

3. One of the problems of the institution is that the Job Development Project excludes the working place with less than 70 workers and with more than 1,000 workers as well. For the place with more than 1,000 workers is supposed to implement the project based upon autonomy of the owner.

   The implementation is not a responsibility but recommended with various incentive payments. Since the management system and human control system of the enterprises have paid more efforts for borrowing skilled labour power and for scouting from outside rather than paying more efforts to develop internal labour force, it is hard to expect them to launch such projects actively.

   Besides 90% of women workers are already excluded from the project since the place with less than 70 workers are excluded. In other words, women are excluded from the chances of job training and development programme which could be the basic energies for adjusting to the change of in- industrial structure and changed development of technology. Therefore it is almost impossible to expect to be leading labour power for women, and it is expected that women workers exist as a finalized labour power.

4. There also is a problem of employer-oriented for the Stability of Employment programme. The most crucial program for the women workers is the support system towards the children care facilities in their working places and the payment of nursing leave. According to the law on equal employment of men and women, the company with more than 300 women workers should have a childcare facility at the company.

   In case of running the facility, the employment insurance foundation finances 400,000won for a month for one teacher. The payment of nursing leave is a sort of counter-measure for the company which gives 30 days of maternity leave and continues to employ those who took the maternity leave more than 30days from the end of the maternity leave.

   The counter- measure amount is won 120,000 for medium and small companies and won 80,000 for a big companies per month. The promotion of this system is in order to prompt companies to employ the married women and to encourage companies to run the company child care centers and to exercise more maternity leaves. However, we question if the prompt can bring with expected effect.

   Regrading to the setting up the company children care facility and maternity leave system, there are regulations for them but, there is no penal provisions. Everything is under the hand of the company in fact. Particularly in case of the maternity leave, the maternity leave payment is not mentioned in the law but, the management of equal employment of men and women regulation only stated "The company has not responsibility of paying wages during the maternity leave but should follow the labour collective agreement and employment regulation(Article 11, clause 4)".

   Therefore there is no way to panel the company if it does not pay for the maternity leave. In the Employment insurance law, there is no structural function for the guarantee of women workers' income. Even though there is subsidy for the maternity leave, it is a counter- measure money for the company which all

   
   
   More basial problem is that the Project upon Stability of Employment excludes the small size companies as well as others. Therefore most women workers are excluded from the training programs for the technical improvement and job training for self development. It results that women workers are still beyond promotion and left behind as marginalities work force and unstable employees.

In addition to working up until a few days before her baby was born, my sister works in a small sweat shop, with four sewing machines but it is so small only one person can stand and work. Due to the large number of orders, she works until midnight or 2 am. My mother is not the only assistant of my sister's home-based work and housework but her husband and I also help her in her work.

My sister does not take care of her children very well even though she is at home.

Because she has production deadlines, she does not have time to be a mother for her children. Her children play on the street without their mother's care. Her overtime work makes her husband upset and her health is getting worse. Therefore, my sister can not be respected as a mother, a worker and a housewife. My poor sister.

Fortunately her mother helps her in all the housework. However other home-based workers who do not have any helper suffer greatly because of the extra burden of housework.

In Korea, there is no nationwide survey of home-based work. Home-based work is regarded as a part-time job but this is a fallacy. Money earned from home-based work is absolutely essential for family survival and is not just pocket money. Home-based workers differ from other factory workers in the respect that the latter have continual work which is not affected by supply dates, production quantities and price.

The company that gives orders to the home-based workers decides these factors. Hence the home-based workers are at the mercy of the company. In this sense, the employment security law for protecting home-based workers which the International Conference for the Solidarity of Home-based workers in Asia held in Amedabed, India in March 20th to 22nd advocated,

and the periodical meeting of the ILO held in June has much significance. We are trying our utmost to gain general recognition that home-based workers are also workers and that the law needs to be reformed to protect them. In addition to this, we are investigating and studying the conditions under which home-based workers must operate in order to find ways of forcing an employment protection law to be legislated and to successfully organize these workers.

During this time, dismissed workers of the LG group have set up a sit-in tent in front of the Twin Building, the main building of the LG group, in Youido, Seoul, and demanded their reinstatement to their former positions. Some of them even carried a baby on their back during the struggle.

However, policemen and LG security guards forcibly removed tents, where workers were temporarily staying, from the front of the LG company. Dismissed workers even slept on the street covering themselves with newspapers, and they never give up the struggle for reinstatement to their former positions.

However, the LG group has not taken any measures to solve this issue. A band of thugs directed by the LG group was sent to violently harrass dismissed workers several times. Over 300 "gangsters" cruelly beaten five workers causing severe bruising.

Their ribs also were broken. Moreover about 10 'gangsters' caught one person and wounded his back with a live cigarette. It obviously was like a hell and is not the action of human beings. The dismissed workers sued the "gangsters." At the same time, LG group also sued the victims. This was terrible!

Consumers of products of the LG group, who knew of this immoral action done by the LG group and the critical situation of dismissed workers, gathered in front of the main building of the LG group on May 2nd, and May 22nd. Over 100 housewives urged the LG group to recover their morality and to solve the problem of dismissed workers.

LG consumers held a picket line and a rally supporting a letter of protest to the LG group president, Ku Pon-sung. With the election of the civilian government, many dismissed workers have been reinstated across the country. However, the LG group has ignored this reality.

Then, how can the LG group say that they love consumers, even though they cannot love their family members such as dismissed workers? LG consumers said that if the dismissed workers are not able to return to their former jobs, then they will co-operate with housewives, students and women's associations and carry on various protest activities including telephone calls and a consumer boycott.

The LG group, which used to advertise that, "consumers are the best decision makers," said to reporters that, "the participants of the rally got paid 20,000 won per person by dismissed workers." It also shouted that, "we don't need consumers like you." This is a clear infringement of the consciousness and human rights of consumers.

One participant, who is a neighbor of a dismissed worker, said that "someone worked very faithfully for the village, and later I found out that he was a dismissed worker of the LG group. Today I am here to help him with a clean heart. We, consumers will not buy products of bad companies, because our consciousness has been raised. We know what is wrong or right. Workers produce goods we use everyday, so how can they be dismissed due to their participation in labor union activities."

The LG group, which has been threatened by consumers' active support of dismissed workers as well as workers' struggle, fabricated an incident on April 19 and filed a law suit against a worker on the grounds of business interference and defamation. He was forcibly arrested by 'gangsters' of the LG group. I, as one of fired workers, feel very sad because this is the real face of the LG group.

Ironically, belief in human respect has been their catch phrase for years. Dismissed workers and their family members have suffered from dismissal for periods of as little as several months to seven or eight years. Their suffering is indescribable and inexpressible. They still have a long and rough struggle ahead.

However, we have been encouraged by a rally by consumers. It proves that our struggle has gained the support from the general public. We also planned another rally at 5 pm. on June 7. LG customers, labor unions, dismissed workers, and students will ask for the release of arrested workers and the reinstatement of dismissed workers at the front of Anyang station. The purpose of the rally will be to expand the struggle to a nationwide level. Today, I will also work untiringly in order to help arrested and dismissed workers and to make the world a place worth living in.

As I write this article, I would like to point out the many contradictions in our social systems and practices which have been hidden under the slogan of globalization. I want to talk about our struggle to correct the contradictions prevailing in our society.

I graduated from high school, but failed to enter university. With a heavy heart, I started to work at Youngchang Instrument Company on March 25, 1988. Youngchang has been famous for its advertisement of "clear, pretty sounding Youngchang piano."

The company produces the largest quantity of pianos, guitars, electric organs and woodworking tools in Korea. About 3,200 employees work for the company.

My job was to process and assemble an internal part of piano, through a conveyer system. At first, I could not go fast enough to match the flow of the conveyer. I wanted to stop work immediately and go home. However, my seniors, I called them sisters, laughed at me and said, "You will be all right after a few days. Is there any easy work in the world?" They really encouraged me.

The word, labor union was very strange to me when I started work. However, I joined the labor union in 1992. Among the 40 members of my section, several workers have been elected as executives of the labor union, in public relations or as the women's representative. In September 1992, I became a woman representative.

After the wage negotiation in June, 1992, there was a wage gap between men and women. According to the agreement, a 13% wage increase and a long service allowance were promised. However, only male workers received the long service allowance, hence female workers did not receive any of the long service allowance paid by the company. The reason was that in general, the wages of female workers have been higher than that of other companies. Even some executive members of the labor union and office workers received more money than the promised long service allowance of 13%.

Throughout, the company has promulgated a slogan of, "Youngchang family and unity between labor and management". It also asked us to work hard as and in return promised good and respectful treatment for workers. However, its slogan seemed to be superficial, because it sought more profit through its system of wage discrimination between male and female workers, and manufacturing and office workers.

It obviously violated the collective agreement as well as the Labor Standard Law Article 6 and Equal Employment Law Article 6 Clause 2.

In the meantime, we distributed fliers several times urging that wage discrimination should be eliminated during the wage negotiation period in April 1995. On the other hand, since the issue provokes problems of violation of the Equal Employment Law, we submitted the case to the Women Workers Association in Inchon, Korean Women Workers Association, and other women's associations.

The written document was sent to the Labor Ministry. However, the company said that our activity was illegal and we have been oppressed severely. Still most of the labor union members accepted and supported our struggle. Without no success, the collective bargaining ended on May 3.

On April 8, the issue of wage discrimination between male and female workers and discrimination on the starting wage were submitted to the employment mediation committee of the Labor Union. We and the company agreed upon the proposal of the mediation committee.

The agreement said that, "The failure to fulfill the collective bargaining agreement in 1992 should be corrected within the year. Further discrimination in the starting wage should be abolished when male and female workers produce the same value under the same working condition."

The labor and management negotiations started on July 11th several issues including wage discrimination between men and women were discussed. The issues were as follows: 400% of unpaid bonus for workers who have been employed for less than one year and overtime payment on Saturday.

The company promised to give the unpaid bonus in October. Due to this success, we distributed fliers to male workers to help them understand the necessity for the same starting wage for men and women. There are still some male workers who do not agree about this in the labor union

Regardless of gender, workers should unite to receive just value for their work. Workers are one even though they have different types of occupation. Discrimination should be abolished immediately. We will surely win our struggle and we will hoist the flag of a democratic labor union soon.