The district court in the industrial city of Ulsan has put the brakes on job inheritance practices at Hyundai Motor.
On Thursday, the court nullified a clause in the automaker’s collective bargaining agreement that requires management to hire a relative of an employee who dies or retires due to an industrial accident, regardless of whether they have the required job skills.
The court said the provision not only “intrudes on the employer’s intrinsic right to hire employees” but “defines something that goes beyond the confines of collective bargaining.”
The ruling came in response to a lawsuit filed by the bereaved family of a Hyundai worker who died of lung cancer in 2011. He retired two years earlier but the Korea Workers’ Compensation and Welfare Service confirmed that his death had been job-related.
The confirmation by the state agency, which operates industrial accident compensation insurance, led the family to demand that the automaker hire one of the victim’s children in compliance with the collective bargaining agreement.
But Hyundai refused to accept the demand on the grounds that the employee was not a union member when he died.
The court ruled that the automaker should pay the victim’s family 56 million won in compensation, as his death was caused by the job he had carried out at Hyundai for 30 years.
But at the same time, it dismissed the family members’ claim to a job at Hyundai by nullifying the provision of the collective bargaining agreement upon which the plaintiff’s demand was predicated.
The court noted that institutionalizing the recruitment of a family member of an industrial accident victim not only “runs afoul of labor-related laws” but “goes against the notion of social justice.”
It was right for the court to rule against the job inheritance arrangement as it is nothing less than “an attempt by union workers to create a secret path to employment for their children,” as the court put it.
Guaranteeing employment from generation to generation should not be tolerated, as it deprives many young people of employment opportunities, pushing them into despair and frustration.
The court’s ruling also throws doubt on the validity of another unfair employment practice at Hyundai. The automaker’s collective bargaining agreement includes a clause that gives recruitment favors to the children of retired or long-serving employees.
In hiring production line workers, Hyundai ensures that the children of company employees account for 25 percent of the applicants who pass the document screening process. It also gives them extra points amounting to 5 percent of the total score in the interview process.
According to reports, about 33 percent of the nation’s top 200 companies that have a trade union give favors to the children of their employees in the recruitment process. Despite public criticism of such practices, these companies have succumbed to pressure from powerful unions.
Yet Thursday’s court ruling should catalyze efforts by these corporations to reform their unfair employment practices. They need to realize that favoring a certain group of applicants undermines their competitiveness.
Trade unionists should also refrain from insisting on privileges for their children as it puts other job seekers at a disadvantage. If they think they deserve greater rewards for their contribution to the prosperity of their companies, they should demand an increase in monetary remuneration, not favors for their children.
