On December 24, 2010, the Foreign Workforce Policy Committee set is plan for the introduction of new foreign labor in 2011. The Committee agreed to bring in 48,000 migrant workers under the Employment Permit System (E-9 visa). This is 14,000 more than the quota set for 2010. The goal of this plan is to meet labor shortages that have arisen as a result of economic recovery in the manufacturing sector and the government's crackdown against and voluntary exit program for undocumented migrants. The Committee decided to maintain the number of H-2 visas for overseas Koreans at 303,000, the same level as last year.
In 2010, the quota for new migrant workers was set at 24,000, but raised to 34,000 at President Lee Myung-bak's order. This increase resulted from the fact that the government was not able to accurately predict the severe labor shortages that small and medium-size businesses faced. As such, the government set the lower quota, saying it was projecting the jobs of native Koreans. Native workers have already shunned the 3D companies where migrant workers usually work for a long time, however. It is not a surprise, therefore, that the labor shortage faced by these business has continued to get worse.
This year as well, the government has said it may raise the quota above 48,000 in the next few months. While migrant workers clearly contribute to the economy, the government has, until this point, failed to respect our rights, paying us for our hard work only with repression. It has continued to slander us and created divisions between us and native workers, saying that we are criminals and that we steal their jobs. These statements stand in contradiction to the fact that the government cannot help but bring in more and more migrant workers every year. It is time now, more than ever, that we fight for the rights the government is denying us.
