For almost a year, South Koreans have been fuming over Yoon Suk-yeol’s 120-hour work week remark. At an average working time of 1,967 hours per employee per year, Korea already has the second longest working period among OECD countries in 2019 — 241 hours more than the OECD average, and 323 hours longer than that of Japan. Yoon himself would later clarify his statement; instead of forcing people to work 120 hours per week, — which he himself deemed as “nonsense” — he simply wanted to give workers the right to work longer if they so desired. Aside from Moon’s 52-hour work week policy, Yoon’s argument also directly goes against his liberal opponent Lee Jae-myung’s campaign promise to introduce four-day work weeks, along with reduced working hours. While Lee Jae-myung’s promise was based on a vision to create more jobs and improve the welfare of all workers, the leader of Yoon’s party, Lee Jun-seok, slammed the plan, saying that it would lead to steep wage cuts, job losses, and worse working environments. According to Lee Jun-seok, the four-day work week policy was doomed to fail because it ignores the basic principles of economics. This recent slurry of contradicting opinions revives the age-old question, why are we so obsessed with the numbers attached to our working period?

While the virtue of hard work is almost universal, South Korea’s history gave hard work an extra layer of significance. South Korea managed to grow from a war-torn country into an economic tiger in just a few decades thanks to its grueling work ethic and unforgiving discipline, which are still prided on to this day. However, South Koreans are starting to question whether such extreme measures are still necessary in these modern times. South Korean working culture is notorious for passive-aggressively forcing employees to work extra hours because “everyone else does that”. The rampant kkondae culture, in which seniors believe that they can force anyone younger than them to do their demands, only rubs salt in the wound. These societal pressures manifest themselves in employees being unable to go home before their seniors and having to cancel all plans to carry out their superiors’ requests, on top of already being overworked with very little say on the matter. The 52-hour work week, first introduced in 2018, was intended to curb this practice by penalizing companies that violate maximum working hours with a hefty fine. The bill itself received a “thumbs up” from 77.8% of workers, while only 15.7% disagreed.

But did the problem end there? While some companies use an integrated work portal system that logs employees’ working time and locks itself after the maximum weekly hours are reached, it is very difficult to check how much work is actually done. In companies without such a system, working hours are almost always only loosely enforced. Without any clear documented ways to prove one’s work length, the risks posed by reporting one’s workplace for violating the 52-hour work week rule far outweigh the benefits. Even with the existence of a tracking system, there are many loopholes both employees and employers can exploit to do work outside the official reported period.

Since the COVID-19 pandemic, the rise of flexible working times presents even more challenges for the 52-hour rule. With the perks of “being able to work anytime you want”, employees have to be ready to be called for work at virtually any time of the week and for any duration their employers deem necessary. This practice is especially prevalent in start-ups pushing for their next big project or funding round — which include game development start-ups Yoon cited as an example in his 120-hour work week remark. One of the most common arguments against Yoon’s stance is how it is prone to coercion. However, this abuse of power has always happened, regardless of what policy the nation adopts. In any case, the problem boils down to this: the numbers written in the work contract are just a formality; in reality, employees are always at the mercy of their employers. For the same reason, it is easy to see why it is difficult to make four-day work weeks work in a vertical society like South Korea: if employees are already violating the five-day work week regulations here and there, how can we expect them to play fair under reduced working days and hours?

The benefits of shorter but more effective working hours are obvious: better work-life balance, increased employee satisfaction, and improved overall performance, to name a few. However, the flaws of working hour regulations are just as glaring as their ideal purpose. We know that in order to fix South Korea’s glamorization of overworking, much more changes need to be done. The quality of the actual work done is much more important than the raw number of hours spent “working”. Workloads need to be distributed more evenly so that last minute grinding before a deadline, such as the example Yoon brought up, needs not happen in the first place. The extreme kkondae mindset needs to be eliminated and the younger generation should be able to respect their seniors without having to submit to all of their wishes. All of these require an extensive reformation of the cultures already deeply ingrained in Korean society; regulating working days and hours is just a band-aid solution to a much more complex problem. As long as these issues persist, no matter what rule is put into place — 52-hour, 120-hour, four-day, or perhaps even crazier work weeks — nothing will ever change.