President Moon highlights benefits of reduced working hours, urges efforts to make sure it leads to job creation

President Moon Jae-in appreciates the parliament's efforts to pass the shorter working hours bill.At a weekly meeting with his aides, the South Korean leader also called on his government to ensure the drive leads to job creation and better working conditions.Hwang Hojun shares with us his remarks. The South Korean President expressed his appreciation for Parliament passing the revision to the Labor Standards Act last week, which reduced the maximum legal working hours from the current 68 hours to 52 hours per week. "The lives of Koreans will now be changed because of shorter working hours. The reduction in working hours is a valuable opportunity to expand the number of jobs." During his meeting with top aides on Monday afternoon, President Moon called for the government's utmost efforts to make sure the recent cut in maximum working hours will ultimately lead to the creation of new jobs and reduce the high youth unemployment rate. "I ask the government to come up with active support measures so the cut in working hours will lead to job sharing and the hiring of more young people." As of January, the unemployment rate of those aged 15 to 29 stood at 8.7 percent, far higher than the overall average of 3.7 percent. During the meeting, President Moon also stressed that shorter working hours will lead to the improvement of overall working and living conditions.He said the initiative will help cultivate an environment where workers can have family dinners and secure a decent work-life balance, which in turn, according to the President, could be the key to solving the serious issue of the nation's record-low birth rate. According to the OECD, South Korea had the longest working hours among OECD members,... with an average of 2-thousand and 69 hours in 2016. President Moon said he wants to cut that number down to 1-thousand-800 a year before the end of 2022.Hwang Hojun, Arirang News.