<Anchor> A
friendly economy, reporter Kwon Ae-ri is with you.
Reporter Kwon, The economic shock caused by Corona 19, especially jobs, is the biggest concern, but there is a data that allows you to compare how you responded to jobs in countries that suffered from Corona 19 worse than us?
<Reporter>
Yes.
In the first half of the year, the US and Europe experienced the most severe aftermath of Corona 19, and the Bank of Korea compared these two.
Lockdown and social blockade have been implemented in the same way.
Now, however, the impact on jobs was very different.
In the future, we will continue to expand our job policy, but let's compare it for reference.
The table you are looking at is the unemployment rate trend in the United States and major European countries this year.
There are unemployment rates in each country from January to June or July, but the difference between Europe and the United States is clear.
In European countries, there has been no significant change in unemployment rates.
In the case of the UK, it is the same throughout the first half.
In France and Italy, the unemployment rate has risen since March when the lockdown began, but they have quickly found stability, and recently, it has been shown to be lower than in January, before the coronavirus outbreak.
Spain has the highest unemployment rate and the stability is not fast, but Spain has had a poor labor market environment since before the coronavirus.
On the other hand, the unemployment rate in the U.S. has risen sharply due to the coronavirus.
In the second quarter of last year, the unemployment rate soared around 10 percentage points from the end of last year.
Although the trend is getting better, it seems a long way to go back before the outbreak.
<Anchor>
The change in the United States was great. What was the difference between the United States and Europe?
<Reporter>
First of all, Europe focused on keeping existing jobs by making the most of things like reducing working hours.
More than one in five European workers worked short-time.
That's why companies don't let people out at all.
To do that, I looked after the employers a lot.
It reduced insurance premiums, compensated for the leave-of-work benefits paid to workers, and simplified the procedure for receiving these.
In fact, the support we are currently implementing is similar to that of Europe.
However, I can see that Europe is more generous in terms of amount and degree.
Germany has greatly increased the allowance paid to short-time workers, and the government pays the full share of the short-time work allowance by the employer by the end of this year.
Non-regular and temporary workers are also included in the application.
The UK also introduced a similar system this time.
In France, government subsidies for businesses that maintain employment were operated on a flat basis and then changed proportionately to wages.
If you continue to hold jobs that originally earned you a lot of hourly money, the government will give your workplace that much more money.
<Anchor>
On the other hand, the United States chose to give unemployment benefits rather than keep a job, right?
<Reporter>
Yes.
There is also the United States to maintain employment, but it is much more focused on unemployment benefits.
The period for receiving unemployment benefits has been increased from 6 months to 9 months.
In addition to the basic unemployment benefits, we gave 700,000 won more in our money each week.
From September, the amount has been cut in half.
Then, in April, unemployment exploded to the extent that the number of applicants for unemployment benefits was 10 times that of February.
While Germany and France only increased by 10-20%.
One US unemployment rate is calculated differently.
Temporarily laid off workers Maintaining health insurance or severance pay and receiving a promise to re-employ you when things get better, those who take a break are classified as unemployed and provide unemployment benefits.
In fact, it is more accurate to determine the size of people whose income has been cut off, and it is similar to those of unpaid leave in Korea, but it can be said that these people are much better off at the moment than those who take unpaid leave of Korea.
This is the case, but as in the table you saw earlier, the unemployment rate in the United States is still far from recovering before the coronavirus.
This means that the future of temporary layoffs who were receiving unemployment benefits is becoming increasingly uncertain.
The Bank of Korea analyzed that there are advantages and disadvantages to both the European method and the American method. For workers, the European method is generally better.
First of all, the wages are reduced.
Because people feel less anxious, they spend less.
However, the Bank of Korea analyzed that generous unemployment benefits might be better for the vulnerable, and that the US method would be more efficient at that time if the economic recovery period comes.
Jobs will recover quickly.
However, it is worth considering that the structure of our labor market differs greatly from the US, where it is easier to enter and exit the labor market.
Anyway, it can be said that Korea, which is taking a method close to Europe, is making more efforts to reduce unemployment.
However, it seems that it will be possible to achieve that purpose more properly if we focus more on supporting the karma that maintains employment more clearly.