President Lee Jae-myung carried out a second cabinet reshuffle to secure governing momentum in his second year in office, but public sentiment has yet to turn. Critics say a string of controversies surrounding Yong Hye-in, nominee for minister of gender equality and family, and Kim Seung-won, nominee for justice minister, has diluted the meaning of the personnel overhaul. Discontent over the Lee administration's housing policy has been building among younger voters and residents of the greater Seoul area, and although the entire economic policy team was replaced, the president's approval rating has continued to decline since the reshuffle.
A Seoul Economic Daily review of polls released in the first week of September found that the defining feature of public opinion this week was a sharpening of negative sentiment among people in their 20s and 30s despite the administration's second cabinet reshuffle. In the reshuffle announced on the 30th of last month, Lee replaced the ministers of six agencies — the Ministry of Finance and Economy, the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport, the Ministry of SMEs and Startups, the Ministry of Justice, the Ministry of Gender Equality and Family, and the Ministry of National Defense — along with presidential aides. Kim Yong-beom, the presidential policy chief who had been retained at the time, abruptly resigned on the 1st of this month, two days after the reshuffle was announced, leaving the core team that had steered economic and housing policy fully reconstituted.
Public Mood Stays Cold After Reshuffle, With Clear Negativity Among Under-40s
The deterioration in public sentiment that prompted the reshuffle has not recovered even after the personnel changes. In an automated wireless telephone survey of 1,000 adults nationwide conducted by the Korea Society Opinion Institute (KSOI) from the 31st of last month through the 1st of this month, positive assessments of Lee's handling of state affairs came to 41.2%, down 1.6 percentage points from the previous survey. Negative assessments rose 1.4 percentage points to 53.9%.
By age group, negative assessments were unusually high among those in their 20s and 30s. Negative responses reached 69.4% among people in their 30s, the highest of any age group, followed by 64.6% among those aged 18 and over in their 20s. Next came people in their 40s at 60.2%, those aged 70 and over at 60.1%, those in their 60s at 59.9% and those in their 50s at 54.9%. Among men in their 30s, negative assessments approached 76.8%.
Other polls also showed a clear downward trend. In a survey of 1,004 adults nationwide conducted by Korea Information Research over the same period, from Aug. 31 to Sept. 1, using automated wireless calls, positive assessments of Lee's handling of state affairs came to 34.7%, a record low for a second consecutive week. Negative assessments stood at 61.9%. Negative assessments reached 70.5% among people in their 30s, 66.6% among those in their 40s and 61.7% among those aged 18 through their 20s.
Analysts say the spreading controversies over some ministerial nominees have weighed on sentiment among younger voters. Yong, born in 1990, is a politician in her 30s who served twice as a proportional representation lawmaker before being nominated as a minister. Criticism has grown inside and outside political circles after she said she would keep her parliamentary seat even after being appointed minister. Questions of preferential treatment have also been raised over the fact that her husband, Park Ki-hong, worked as a staff official at the Basic Income Party, the same party she belongs to, drawing a monthly salary of 3 million won.
Observers say the situation inevitably deepens a sense of deprivation among people in their 20s and 30s, who are sensitive to questions of fairness. Song Young-gil, a lawmaker with the Democratic Party, said on SBS radio recently that it would "not be easy for the public to accept" Yong, adding that she had "suddenly risen to prominence and received preferential treatment on multiple levels." With conservative parties including the People Power Party and the Reform Party, as well as progressive parties, calling for her nomination to be withdrawn, there is concern that the situation could weigh on an administration that has made national unity and broadening its base its banner.
Allegations that Kim solicited favors related to a clinical trial for a COVID-19 treatment have also emerged as a major point of contention. Kim's side has rejected the characterization, saying he simply relayed a grievance filed in the public interest, but the dispute is expected to continue through the confirmation hearing process.
Yong and Kim Controversies Halve the Impact of the Personnel Shake-Up
Public reaction to the six-ministry reshuffle was indeed cool. In the KSOI survey, positive assessments of the reshuffle came to just 37.7%, while negative assessments stood at 46.6%, exceeding positive views by 8.9 percentage points. Among those aged 18 and over in their 20s, positive assessments were only 17.1% against 56.4% negative, a gap of 39.3 percentage points. Among people in their 30s, negative assessments also led by a wide margin, at 54% against 27.9% positive.
A survey by the Reform Research Institute, a think tank affiliated with the Reform Party, produced similar results. In an automated wireless survey of 1,017 adults nationwide conducted on the 2nd, 65% said the second reshuffle was handled poorly, more than double the 30.8% who said it was handled well. Negative assessments reached 80.3% among those in their 20s and younger and 70.2% among those in their 30s, showing a pronounced negative perception of the reshuffle among younger respondents.
Views on how the reshuffle would affect the administration's governance going forward were also negative, at 59.7%, far exceeding the 26.9% who were positive. On the question of sitting lawmakers holding ministerial posts concurrently, 80.9% said it would be preferable to resign the parliamentary seat and focus on the ministerial role. Asked what should matter most in appointing ministers, 54.6% cited expertise and experience in the relevant field, followed by integrity and ethics at 27.1% and sharing the president's governing philosophy at 9.4%.
The strong opposition to lawmakers serving concurrently as ministers, together with the emphasis on expertise and integrity as appointment criteria, dovetails with the controversy surrounding Yong. Questions have been raised about her expertise in particular, because none of the 116 bills and resolutions she introduced as a lead sponsor in the 21st and 22nd National Assemblies fell under the jurisdiction of the gender equality and family committee. Oh Jun-ho, a candidate for leader of the Basic Income Party, countered on MBC radio recently that "given the nature of gender equality legislation, it is scattered across the jurisdictions of various standing committees."
Mixed Signals in Greater Seoul: Approval Up 11 Points in One Poll, Down 8 in Another
Also notable is the divergence across polls in Lee's approval rating in Seoul and the surrounding region, where housing issues carry particular weight. In the KSOI survey, positive assessments of his handling of state affairs in Seoul came to 44.7%, up 11.1 percentage points from the previous survey's 33.6%. Negative assessments fell 9.6 percentage points over the same period, to 51.1% from 60.7%. In Gyeonggi and Incheon, positive assessments came to 40.7% and negative assessments to 54.1%, roughly in line with the previous survey's 41.1% positive and 54.4% negative.
The Korea Information Research survey, by contrast, showed Lee's approval rating in Seoul falling 8 percentage points to 29% from 37%. Negative assessments rose 6.4 percentage points over the same period, to 68.4%. Positive assessments in Gyeonggi and Incheon also fell, to 31.8% from 34.9%, while negative assessments rose to 64.5% from 63.8%.
Attention now turns to how the government's partial revision of its property tax overhaul will affect sentiment in the greater Seoul area. At a cabinet meeting on the 1st, the government finalized a plan to keep the basic deduction under the comprehensive real estate holding tax at the current 1.2 billion won for owners of a single home who do not live in it. Under the initial plan announced on the 3rd of last month, the basic deduction for single-home owners living in their property would have been raised to 1.4 billion won from 1.2 billion won, while the deduction for those not living in their home would have been cut to 900 million won. The government reversed course to the existing level within a month after criticism that the tax burden on the latter group could become excessive. It also scrapped a plan to raise the cap on increases in the tax burden to 200%, opting to keep the current 150%.
With the government's bill now before the National Assembly, further revisions cannot be ruled out. Within the Democratic Party, one idea under discussion is to set the basic deduction for all single-home owners at 1.4 billion won regardless of whether they live in the property. There are also calls to keep the fair market value ratio at the current 60% rather than raising it to 70% as the government proposes. The government maintains that some degree of tax differentiation between those who live in their homes and those who do not is necessary, so political debate over the basic deduction for non-occupant single-homeowners and the fair market value ratio is expected to continue through parliamentary review.
For the governing Democratic Party in particular, further adjustments to win back voters on housing have emerged as a key task. With approval ratings continuing to slide, how the party manages sentiment over the tax overhaul could determine whether its support rebounds. In the KSOI survey, support for the Democratic Party came to 39.3%, down 3.2 percentage points from the previous survey, while the People Power Party rose 1.6 percentage points to 33.6%, narrowing the gap between the two parties to 5.7 percentage points. The Korea Information Research survey put the Democratic Party at 40.5% and the People Power Party at 40.1%, a gap of just 0.4 percentage points. With Democratic Party leader Kim Min-seok having pledged to lift the party's support by 10 percentage points within his first 100 days, the drop below 40% about two weeks into his tenure could prove a burden, analysts said.
All of the polls cited in this article were conducted using automated wireless calls. Response rates were 5.9% for the KSOI survey and 4.3% for the Korea Information Research survey, with a margin of error of plus or minus 3.1 percentage points at a 95% confidence level. The Reform Research Institute survey had a margin of error of plus or minus 3.1 percentage points at a 95% confidence level, with a response rate of 3.48%. Further details are available on the website of the National Election Survey Deliberation Commission.
