보건복지부 영문홈페이지

National Basic Livelihood Security To Be Expanded to Eliminate Blind Spots of Poverty

- Formulation and Announcement of the “3rd Comprehensive Plan

for Basic Livelihood Security (2024~2026)” -

- The livelihood and housing benefits selection criteria and the medical benefit eligibility criteria for obligatory providers to be eased for greater coverage.

- The property conversion criteria for motor vehicles to be eased.

- 210,000 and 50,000 more people to be newly eligible for livelihood benefits and medical benefits, respectively -

<Summary>

J is a 51-year-old man living in Gyeonggi-do with his wife and two children aged 16 and 14. He is a construction worker whose monthly income is around KRW 1.9 million. Since he has a long commute, he spends a considerable amount of money on fuel and struggles to make ends meet. He applied for livelihood benefit but was not eligible for the benefit because 100% of the assessed value of the 2018 SM5 (1,998cc) vehicle that he owns, equivalent to KRW 10 million, was counted as his monthly income. From next year, however, the criteria for motor vehicles used mainly for livelihood purposes will be eased, and J will become eligible for KRW 500,000 per month in livelihood benefits.

The Ministry of Health and Welfare (Minister Cho, KyooHong) announced the “3rd Comprehensive Plan for Basic Livelihood Security (2024~2026)” including the basic livelihood security policy and policy direction for the next three years.

Under the plan, the government will improve and implement a wide range of policies to substantially secure the basic livelihood standards for people by proactively identifying and eliminating poverty blind spots and raising the quality of basic livelihood security.

Firstly, blind spots of poverty will be proactively identified and eliminated. ▴The medical benefit eligibility criteria for obligatory providers for persons with severe disabilities with high demand for medical services will be eased in phases to add over 50,000 more people to the list of medical benefit recipients. ▴ The property criteria for motor vehicles* will also be eased to minimize the cases of ineligibility due to strict rules. ▴The selection criteria for housing benefit will be revised from “47% to 50% of the standard median income”, which will allow an additional 200,000 people to be newly eligible for housing benefits.

* ▴For multiple people and multiple children households and households living in islands or remote areas, the general property conversion rate of 4.17% will be applied, ▴ Motor vehicles used mainly for livelihood will be excluded from conversion into general property, ▴ The criteria for motor vehicles subject to general property conversion will be relaxed, ▴ The property conversion rate for motor vehicles will be lowered.

The coverage of basic livelihood security will be significantly expanded. The selection criteria for livelihood benefit eligibility will be raised from “30% to 35% of the standard median income” to increase the number of recipients by approximately 210,000 people, and the minimum benefit amount will be considerably increased.

Other measures aimed at alleviating poverty and achieving financial self-sufficiency include ▴ raising the age limit from under 24 to under 30 for youth eligible for additional deduction from earned and business income, ▴increasing the number of self-sufficiency work program participants in proportion to the number of basic livelihood benefit recipients and ▴increasing the cumulative number of the recipients of asset accumulation programs from 113,000 up to 150,000.///