We have foreigners not investing in Korea, special treatment for GIs, prosecuting an old lefty crank and much more.
- Today, the Chosun Ilbo asks why foreigners don’t want to invest in Korea, demands Roh Moo-hyun turn over the Cheong Wa Dae files, and goes after the Korean Government Employees’ Union for possibly holding a no-confidence vote on President Lee Myung-bak.
- The Hankyoreh, on the other hand, slams the prosecutors for placing a travel ban on 20 netizens for conducting an advertiser boycott campaign of the Chosun, JoongAng and Dong-A dailies, criticizes President Lee Myung-bak for claiming that continued candlelight protests would hurt the Korean economy, and blames Lee Myung-bak for weakening South Korean influence in the six-party talks by letting intra-Korean relations go to pot and focusing too much on the Korea-US alliance.
- Hey, look who’s back to work! Whether this is a good thing, well, I’m not sure — with lawmakers on the streets rather than in the National Assembly, at least they could do relatively little damage to the country.
- The Chosun Ilbo notes foreign concerns about the Korean economy. I’m not an economist, so with just about everything else I say, feel perfectly free to dismiss it as the ramblings of a guy who has absolutely no idea what he’s talking about, but the conservative press has been warning of Korea’s imminent economic collapse for as long as I can remember (which, admittedly, is not that long), usually in the context of blaming left-wing administrations or left-wing forces (in this case, the US beef protests), which leads me to believe the economy will be just fine.
- Yonhap reports that US beef has quickly surpassed 10% of all imported beef since the resumption of imports. Aussie beef is still dominant, accounting for 70% of the market, with Kiwiland accounting for most of the rest. Interestingly enough, per kilo, US beef is more expensive than its Australian and New Zealand competitors, although this might be because of the particular cuts the US has been selling since the restart of imports.
- Did police in Dongducheon give a US soldier accused of attempted rape special treatment? Well, frankly, it wouldn’t surprise me if they did — it’s not as if the police and prosecutors up in Uijeongbu/Dongducheon don’t have a record of laziness in this regard.
- Arresting priests and monks? Ugly business… ugly business. Rather than giving the candle burners ammunition, the government should be riding this out until the protesters get tired, public opinion turns completely against them or the protesters do something really stupid (which, for the most part, is exactly what the government has done). On a positive note, at least Seoul Plaza is returning to normal.
- Professor Song Du-yul is back in the news, with prosecutors deciding to retry the guy in absentia. What the point in this exercise is, I’m not quite certain — they should have just left the crank alone.
7 Comments
Oh, so that’s what my student was talking about when he said he saw American cows on TV that had mad cow disease. Fucking downer cows, that’s all they were. Damn, people are freaking gullible sometimes.
Whoops, wrong thread.
Going back to the government unions striking to impeach the president.. there is no way in hell S.Korea can ever move forward with badly needed restructuring to attract foreign and domestic investments when there are various factions of unions striking everyday for one reason or another.
Unions are the biggest problem hindering Korea’s competitiveness. There’s only one solution for the unions - a complete liquidation of their organizations. Something like what Ronald Reagan did in 1981 against the air traffic controller’s strike would be nice. Reagan fired all the strikers and hired eager non unions who were willing to work. Korean government should also do the same thing if those government workers go on strike. Fire them all and hire non union workers. One of the first government targets should be the KTU. Get rid of them all if they go on strike.
As for the clueless private sectors like the Hyundai Motor company and what they can do to fight the union.. maybe bring in Hyundai assembly workers from factories abroad and give them Korean wages. And fire those worthless Korean workers who decide to go on strike.
Why do foreigners not want to invest in Korea? Oh, I don’t know. Is it maybe because we come here and rescue a nationwide bank that no Korean is willing to touch. We turn the operation around and save the related jobs. But oh no! We also turn a profit and then get stamped on by public opinion and a zealous prosecutor’s office.
Or is it also because Korea’s troubles go well beyond the heads-up-their-arses unions. Could it be the overall protest culture, the inability of Koreans to cooperate or negotiate fairly with non-Koreans, the demand for unfettered access to foreign markets while building countless barriers to deny foreigners access to Korea, or maybe the rest of the world cannot understand how a nation and race so convinced of their superiority can at the same time endlessly play the victim card when things don’t go their way. Perhaps foreign investors are wary of dealing with an irrational nation and public who are more frightened of a hamburger than of a lunatic sitting a few kilometres north who has countless artillery and maybe nuclear weapons pointed at them.
I’m glad they’re finally back at work. They’ve got some housing policy stuff to pass ASAP.
#4 You hit the nail on the head. I’d say 70% of the lack of investment is down to the Lone Star fiasco.
Investors are now worried that they’ll be treated as criminals if they turn a profit. I remember a Korean newspaper columnist (memory fails me on which one) writing “they took more money out of Korea than they brought in”, and laying it out like a criminal charge. I think many in the media here have a skewed understanding of what foreign investment is; they feel foreigners should come in, leave a bundle of cash, and head for the airport. Taking more money out than you bring in is an example of successful foreign investment - it means that the venture was profitable.
The other 30% is down to execs returning home after being in Korea, and reporting what a nightmare it is to do business, in comparison with Vietnam, China, Malaysia, etc.
“Why do foreigners not want to invest in Korea? Oh, I don’t know. Is it maybe because we come here and rescue a nationwide bank that no Korean is willing to touch. We turn the operation around and save the related jobs. But oh no! We also turn a profit and then get stamped on by public opinion and a zealous prosecutor’s office.”
Just the perception of extracting a profit from the collective is sufficient to arouse the sleeping giant of the borg. You could describe the US military intervention in the same terms as above, except that there has been no net profit to the US. Still, the idea that somebody somewhere is profiting from Korea is enough to get the borg moving.