한국의 퇴직연금제도 유효성 증대 방안에 관한 연구

Since the inception of ERBSA(Employee Retirement Benefit SecurityAct) in Korea, many companies began adopting retirement pension. Especially, the companies which have been running R.I or R.T(RetirementInsurance/Retirement Trust) are very keen to convert them intoretirement pension. Due to the year-end extinction of tax-exemptionwhich has been given to R.I and R.T, they cannot help taking theconversion into active account. On the other hand, in case of corporatepension adoption, they can keep getting tax-exemption after 2010 assame as before. That is the first reason why corporates should consideradopting retirement pension. As of June, 25. 2010, about 20% of thewhole companies in Korea have already chosen corporate pension andconsiderably more companies are expected to newly subscribe to ituntil the end of this year. The scale of accumulated amount of retirement pension is predicted toreach 25 trillion won, showing 70 percent net growth only this year. In fact, considering drastic socio-demographic change, companiesneed to more actively prepare for faultless retirement plan for theiremployees. As widely known, Korea will be plagued with the side effects resultingfrom low fertility rate and population aging in the forseeable future. Those two primary hurdles are attributed to the bigger necessities ofmore affirmative adoption of retirement pension by the corporations. Despite the magnitude of serious situation, for the past 4years since theonset of retirement pension in Korea, the companies have not optimizedspecific type and concrete contents for retirement pension they picked. Their mere interest lied in fulfilling the lowest legal limit imposed bythe government authorities such as 8.3% contribution of annual salaryand 60% external funding of DB. They were the most basic and minimumrequirements forcibly conducted by legal binding. As the case stands, when we look over the reasons and the status ofwhy and how the companies are implementing retirement pension, muchremains to be corrected and added from wholly different perspective. Advancing from the minimum fulfillment of legal limit such as 8.3%contribution and formal acquisition of employee agreement, thecompanies ought to think how they will develop and better employeewelfare by the help of retirement pension. Implementing retirementpension regardless of industry type which the company belongs to,average annual wage increase rate and service period of totalemployees will only result in defective employee welfare system. Breaking from the prevalent convention, the companies need to thinkabout the real effectiveness of retirement pension implementation. Toenlarge the employee welfare and morale enhancement which will bringabout productivity improvement and increase of corporation value,active reflection of specific work situation should be made inimplementing retirement pension. In this respect, hybrid type of retirement pension which can reflectcompany circumstance should be made use of along with existing DB & DC. The government, labor, and business should participate in collectingbetter ideas and drawing up new policies in order to lead currentretirement pension system into more powerful and effective employeewelfare tool.