Industrial Workforce Policy for an Economy in Transition

Young Min Kim ()
Additional contact information
Young Min Kim: Korea Institute for Industrial Economics and Trade, Postal: Sejong National Research Complex, Korea Institute for Industrial Economics and Trade, 370 Sicheong Dae-ro C-dong 8-12F 30147, Republic of Korea, http://www.kiet.re.kr

No 23-13, Industrial Economic Review from Korea Institute for Industrial Economics and Trade

Abstract: Effective industrial workforce policies that facilitate the supply and demand of labor are crucial, especially during times of industrial transition. We are living through three such transitions, with the ongoing green transformation, digital transformation, and rapidly changing domestic and foreign industrial policies. According to the Korean Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy (MOTIE), the Industrial Technology Labor-Force (ITL) in five promising new industries will face a critical shortage of workers. These new growth sectors will need 140,000 new workers by 2030. In light of the rapid growth of the global semiconductor industry, one of the country’s leading industries, the number of the workers in the sector is set to increase between 12.7 million and 17.7 million workers from 2021 to 2030, ultimately topping out at around 30.4 million workers. Demand for labor in these new industries is expected to increase faster than before due to the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. Ensuring stability in supply and demand of high-skilled workers is vital for industrial development and industrial competitiveness. However, the labor market has become more complex in the face of digital transformation and amid emerging new industries and technology. Rapid changes in industrial structure and production processes, coupled with uncertainties in labor demand, and the faster depreciation of accumulated skills have made the return on educational investment less certain, reducing the incentive to participate in education and training programs to acquire new skills and competencies, leading to a suboptimal labor supply in new industries. These challenges in the supply and demand for workers can result in labor input inefficiencies, creating a vicious cycle of languid industrial development followed by weakened industrial competitiveness and lower labor demand. Therefore, effective industrial labor policies are critical to ensure continued industrial development and competitiveness during periods of industrial transition. This paper analyzes the supply and demand for ITL and industrial labor policies in Korea. It also describes the implications the findings carry for industrial workforce policy during periods of industrial transition.

Keywords: labor; labor economics; labor policy; labor demand; labor supply; industrial-technological labor; ITL; industrial labor; industrial workforce; industrial workforce policy; industrial labor policy; labor market policy; labor market dynamics; Korea (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: J00 J01 J08 J10 J21 J24 J38 J44 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 12 pages
Date: 2023-06-30
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-inv
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=4498108 Full text (application/pdf)
Our link check indicates that this URL is bad, the error code is: 410 Gone

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:ris:kieter:2023_013

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in Industrial Economic Review from Korea Institute for Industrial Economics and Trade Sejong National Research Complex, Korea Institute for Industrial Economics and Trade, 370 Sicheong Dae-ro C-dong 8-12F 30147, Republic of Korea. Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Aaron Crossen ().