Nearly 70,000 under 30s subject to gift tax

More than 70,000 people under the age of 30 are obliged to pay a gift tax for receiving assets in 2021, marking a two-fold increase from the year before, data showed Monday.

According to Rep. Jin Sun-mee from the Democratic Party of Korea, 70,115 people under 30 are obliged to pay a gift tax for receiving land, properties or securities in 2021. Jin is a member of the Strategy & Finance Committee at the National Assembly and the data was provided by the National Tax Service.

Jin argued the figure shows that more people are trying to evade heavy taxation through gifting.

“Some deem that the increase of gifting to children and young people could be the balloon effect of higher comprehensive real estate tax rates,” Jin said, referring to the real estate tax levied on a significant number of local homeowners.

"Many multiple-home owners are gifting their asset to their children who do not own homes to ease the burden of holding tax. Gift tax should not be a means to evade capital gains tax or holding tax," Jin said, calling for a modification of the overall taxation system.

The figure marks a steep rise from the 34,036 from the year before.

Of the 70,115, those in their 20s totaled 46,756, while 13,975 were in their teens and 9,384 were under the age of 10.

In 2020, 22,980 were in their 20s, 6,764 were in their 10s and 4,292 were under the age of 10 received gifts liable for taxation.

The overall population obliged to pay gift tax increased, too.

There are a total of 275,592 people who are obliged to pay gift tax for receiving assets in 2021 in Korea, up nearly 50 percent from the 183,499 from the year before.

With the increase, the total tax amount surged. The total amount of gift taxation for all age groups was 8.97 trillion won ($6.84 billion), up 59 percent from 5.63 trillion won from the year before.