<Anchor>



Over the past 5 years, the national debt has increased by more than 400 trillion won due to the use of it to respond to the corona virus.

This is all the money that the people have to repay, and the government has decided to reduce this debt through austerity in the future.



Reporter Jo Ki-ho reports.



<Reporter>



It is a national debt clock that shows the national debt.



Debt has already accumulated over 100 trillion won at 20 million won per person, and it continues to increase by 1.84 million won per second.



To slow this down as much as possible, the government has announced that it will do a budget restructuring.



[President Seok-Yeol Yoon: The financial situation has deteriorated significantly over the past five years.

In order to overcome the current issues of livelihood and the financial crisis, the government must take the initiative and tighten the belt.] Even if you take out



debt, you have decided to make a deficit within 3% of GDP in the future.



The national debt is now over 50% of GDP, and we plan to tie it down to the mid-50% by 2027, when the president's term ends.



To achieve this goal, we have decided to spend less by 12 trillion won by reducing the number of projects that require money.



It was decided to sell unnecessary public institutions and government property and bundle the salaries and quota of civil servants.



We also changed the law that mandates that more than 20% of the national tax be used unconditionally for elementary, middle, and high school budgets to support universities or reduce national debt.



But there are also opposing views.



You said that you would additionally reflect more than 200 trillion won in the presidential pledged budget, but is it correct?



[Lee Sang-min / Senior Member of Nara Salim Research Institute: There is no way in this world to reduce taxes, increase the expenditure we want, and improve the fiscal balance.

It is correct to be a little more honest and tell the current financial reality accurately.]



If tax revenues increase and government expenditures are reduced, the country's livelihood will become stronger, but the objection that even the government closes its wallets in a situation where there are concerns about an economic downturn will not help the economy. There is also.