Lee Jun-seok: "France today is Korea's future… Lee, change your fiscal philosophy"

Lee Jun-seok, leader of the Reform New Party, told President Lee Jae-myung, "Change your philosophy regarding fiscal policy. If we do not stop now, France's today will become the Republic of Korea's future." He raised concerns that the recent deterioration of France's fiscal soundness should serve as a cautionary example.

On the 7th, he wrote on Facebook, "President Macron of France simultaneously played the contradictory cards of tax cuts and expanded welfare, and when the finances faltered, politics collapsed," saying this.

He warned, "France's crisis is a warning addressed to Korea. Korea is more vulnerable. National debt has exceeded 50% of gross domestic product (GDP)." He added, "Numerically it is lower than France's, but we are not a reserve currency country. In a crisis we cannot print currency or secure dollars immediately. At this pace the debt-to-GDP ratio will exceed 150% in 40 years."

He continued, "President Lee Jae-myung said, 'Saying the country should not go into debt is ignorant talk.' He compared issuing national bonds to farming, saying, 'If you can harvest one gam in the fall, you should borrow seed to sow.'" He emphasized, "But that seed is the people's taxes, and the people are ultimately the ones who will harvest the sacks."

He specifically questioned the government's lending regulations, asking, "Why strengthen regulations while saying it's fine to increase national debt freely? Has the president's economic view moved beyond 'hotel economics' to become a constitutionally ingrained 'tragedy of the commons'?"

He said, "The president's vote-buying philosophy has been clear since his time as governor of Gyeonggi Province. Through three rounds of disaster basic income, he left nearly 2 trillion won in debt burden, and that burden still falls on Gyeonggi residents." He pointed out, "As a member of the National Assembly from Gyeonggi Province, I found that complaints pour in across the southern Gyeonggi region, including Dongtan, demanding expanded wide-area buses, road networks, and new schools, but empty finances are holding them back."

"A fiscal crisis is not a matter of which political camp wins or loses, but a matter of national survival," he said. "The ruling party must persuade its own supporters, and the opposition must do the same. In the upcoming budget session of the National Assembly, each lawmaker must become 300 ants rather than a grasshopper."

Shin Hyun-bo, Hankyung.com reporter greaterfool@hankyung.com