Securing equal work opportunities

[Context] During Korea’s rapid growth, national policy emphasized other arenas of economic development and reconstruction from the Korean War the in early 1950’s and focused less on the welfare and employment of people with disabilities. However, awareness of the rights of people with disabilities increased throughout the 1980s, and especially with the international spotlight brought by the 1988 Seoul Olympics and Paralympics, public interest turned more to this issue. [Development Challenge] The awareness of the rights of people with disabilities increased throughout the 1980s, and especially with the international spotlight brought by the 1988 Seoul Olympics and Paralympics, public interest turned more to this issue. While the labor force participation rate and the Employment to population ratio 3 of Korea were 61.9 percent and 52.8 percent respectively, those rates were much lower among the persons with disabilities – with a 43.9 percentage of labor force participation rate and 31.9 percentage of employment to population ratio. Also, despite the mandatory quota system introduced in 1990, the unemployment rate of the people with disabilities did not remarkably improve. It was clear that to fully achieve its intended policies, the Korean government would need to adjust its approaches.