Finance Ministry torn between restoring fiscal balance and welfare for aging KoreaWill the government continue deleveraging or spend more for better welfare? Cornered into juggling the two contradictory urges, the Finance Ministry spoke of its plans and challenges ahead in setting a long-term fiscal policy. Koo Bon-jin, chief of the ministry’s public finances, said his team will soon lay out a fresh fiscal plan looking to 2020 and beyond, seeking ways to sustain budget balance on the back of eve

The Fair Trade Commission on Sunday levied a fine of 194 billion won ($175.9 million) on 10 flat panel makers including Samsung Electronics, for price-fixing their flat TV and notebook computers.The fine is the largest ever slapped on an international cartel, of which Korea’s LG Display and Taiwan’s liquid crystal display makers AU Optronics, Chimei Innolux Corp., Chunghwa Picture Tubes and HannStar Display Corp. are members, the watchdog said. The watchdog said the collusion included adjusting

Russia is optimistic about North Korea’s recent talks with the South and the United States over its nuclear weapons programs, Seoul’s top nuclear envoy said Saturday. Returning from his three-day visit to Russia, Lim Sung-nam said, “Russia is viewing the two rounds of South-North and North-U.S. talks positively,” in a phone interview with the Yonhap news agency.Lim left for Russia earlier this week as part of policy coordination efforts with member nations of six-party talks on ending North Kore

Third umbrella union to launch Tuesday, vowing ‘no politics,’ more benefits Korea’s labor unions had their day.With violent strikes and street protests, they made contributions to advancing democracy and improving labor rights in the 1970s and 1980s. But those days are gone. What unions need to do now is to break away from their stereotyped militant showdown with police and find a new way to address their issues, said Jung Yeon-soo who leads a movement to launch a new umbrella organization. “We

The bodies of two pilots of a South Korean cargo plane that crashed into waters off the southern resort island of Jeju were recovered on Sunday nearly three months after the accident took place, Jeju maritime police said.The pilots ― Choi Sang-gi, the 52-year-old captain of the plane, and Lee Jeong-wung, his 43-year-old deputy ― had been unaccounted for after their Boeing 747 cargo plane operated by Asiana Airlines crashed into waters about 107 kilometers west of the island in an accident presum

But quarterly net income reaches 3.44 trillion won, 23 percent down on-yearSamsung Electronics on Friday posted 41.27 trillion won ($37.35 billion) in sales and 4.25 trillion won in operating profit for the third quarter of this year, a better-than-expected performance on the strength of record-breaking sales of mobile handsets.The world’s top memory chip supplier and second-biggest handset maker also recorded 3.44 trillion won in quarterly net income, representing a 23 percent decrease year-on-

Police are investigating four panelists of an Internet podcast over allegations they spread false information about Na Kyung-won, the Grand National Party’s unsuccessful candidate in Wednesday’s Seoul mayoral by-election. According to the National Police Agency, the investigation was launched after Na’s election camp filed a complaint against the four ― political commentator Kim Yong-min; former Democratic Party lawmaker Chung Bong-ju; magazine reporter Ju Jin-woo; and Kim Eo-jun, head of online

Five opposition parties on Friday reiterated their vehement disapproval of the free trade pact with the U.S., saying they would mobilize “all possible means” to block its parliamentary passage.The main opposition Democratic Party also said that the removal of the clauses concerning the Investor-State Dispute Settlement is the “only condition” for its ratification.Calling some of their worries “unfounded,” the ruling Grand National Party urged them to cooperate in ratifying the pact, which has be

The government said on Friday it is considering setting a limit on the total number of lottery tickets issued in a bid to cool red-hot lottery fever. The Korea Lottery Commission, an agency under the Ministry of Strategy and Finance, raised the lottery ticket issuance limit for this year to 2.8 trillion won ($2.5 billion) on Thursday, up from 2.5 trillion won, to meet the surging demand.The Finance Ministry is now trying to stem the lottery boom from heating up further after the launch of a pens