On May 26, the National Union of Samsung Electronics (NSEU) held a large-scale demonstration in Seoul to appeal to Samsung Electronics to provide higher salaries and more vacation time.
It is reported that Samsung Electronics promised to end the policies that hinder the development of organized labor in 2020, and therefore successfully attracted a large number of members to join. At the same time, Li Zaireng, the chairman of the company, also publicly apologized for the scandal of sabotaging the trade union strategy and announced that he would abandon the concept of "no trade union".
Even so, Samsung Electronics still plans to raise employees' salaries by 5.1% this year, but union members still insist on increasing one day of annual leave and implementing a more transparent performance-based bonus system. At present, the two sides have resumed negotiations and plan to hold major discussions on May 28.
Samsung Electronics said in a statement that it would sincerely engage in dialogue with the trade union. At the same time, facing challenges in many fields, including the semiconductor chip industry, Samsung recently changed the head of its semiconductor department to deal with the so-called "crisis".
It is worth noting that trade union officials pointed out that young employees are increasingly aware of the role of trade unions in creating a fairer workplace, while some older generation employees are worried that trade unions may affect work efficiency. According to the data of the Ministry of Labor of South Korea, the trade union membership rate in South Korea has been around 10% since 2004. "More and more people in the company are beginning to realize why they need to establish trade unions," said Son Woo mok, president of the National Economic Trade Union Federation of Korea
