In a little break from writing about mundane Korean legal topic, here is an article from the Washington Post that sheds a little light on the North Korean economy. Well worth a read.
The economy in North Korea is growing, mainly, because of the contributions of Korean workers working outside North Korea in Chinese owned textile mills, mines, restaurants and other industries shunned by the, increasingly, wealthy Chinese workers.
The Washington Post has a great article on this situation. The article, notes, in part that:
Gaesong Industrial Complex in North Korea “In the clothing factory, the women work 13 hours a day, 28 or 29 days a month, and are paid $300 each a month — one-third of which they keep. The rest goes back to the government in Pyongyang.
‘Even though I want to pay them more, I have to send a certain amount home to my country, so this is all I can give them,’ Kim said in his office at the factory.
On his desk, an open laptop revealed that visitors had interrupted his game of solitaire.
The women work on the third floor, wearing their coats inside to guard against the cold, and live on the second floor in shared, dormitory-style rooms decorated with a banner declaring, “Let’s realize the revolutionary ideas of Kim Il Sung and Kim Jong Il” alongside portraits of the two former leaders, grandfather and father, respectively, of Kim Jong Un. Signs on the doors read, ‘Call each other comrade.’
North Korea is thought to have at least 50,000 workers outside the country earning money for the regime, and 13,000 of them work in Dandong.
This neon explosion of a city contrasts starkly with the North Korean city of Sinuiju, on the opposite bank of the river, where there is only a smattering of light at night.”
The article may be found at: North Korea’s Growing Economy and America’s Misconception About it. Worth a read. Back to the boring legal article for tomorrow.
The Chinese government, near the Chinese boarded, has established textile manufacturing zones run by Korean workers.
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Sean Hayes may be contacted at: SeanHayes@ipglegal.com.
Sean Hayes is co-chair of the Korea Practice Team at IPG Legal. He is the first non-Korean attorney to have worked for the Korean court system (Constitutional Court of Korea) and one of the first non-Koreans to be a regular member of a Korean law faculty. Sean is ranked, for Korea, as one of only two non-Korean lawyers as a Top Attorney by AsiaLaw.
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