Restrictions on Number of People and Business Hours with Quarantine Pass... "Powerless Self-Employed Face Triple Hardship"

The government will implement social distancing measures for three weeks from the 17th of this month to the 6th of next month, easing the private gathering limit from the current 4 people to 6 people. However, the operating hours for restaurants and cafes will remain restricted until 9 PM. Despite the continued spread of the COVID-19 Omicron variant, the private gathering limit has been relaxed considering the opposition from self-employed business owners. The photo shows a notice about the gathering limit posted at a restaurant in downtown Seoul on the 14th, when the government announced these adjusted distancing measures. Photo by Kim Hyun-min kimhyun81@

The government has introduced a new adjustment plan to lift the quarantine pass applied to large nationwide marts, department stores, and academies, but self-employed business owners who were excluded from the lift, such as restaurants, cafes, and PC rooms, are strongly protesting. With restrictions on private gathering sizes and shortened business hours still in place, the continued application of the quarantine pass means triple-layered business restrictions, leading to complaints that "the more we cooperate with quarantine measures, the greater our losses become."

Self-employed business owners expressed anger that small business owners and individual entrepreneurs are being left behind in the government's inconsistent quarantine policies. Mr. Lee, who runs a cafe in Ogeum-dong, Songpa-gu, Seoul, pointed out, "The government initially introduced the quarantine pass excessively, which reduced the number of customers and made store management difficult. Now, they are lifting it only for marts and department stores, so I have no idea what criteria they are using to decide this." He added, "They say they will lift the quarantine pass for provincial department stores following Seoul department stores for regional fairness, but why don't they consider fairness by industry?"

Mr. Jang, who operates a barbecue restaurant in Yonggang-dong, Mapo, lamented, "Between marts with hundreds or thousands of visitors and restaurants where family groups of six come in, which do you think is more dangerous in common sense?" He continued, "The New Year’s special season and graduation and entrance ceremony seasons are things of the past, and I’m just worried about how we will get through the Lunar New Year holiday under these conditions."

Although the government relaxed the maximum number of private gathering members from four to six starting today, demands to ease business hours rather than the gathering limit are also increasing. Currently, restaurants and cafes are only accepting orders until around 8 p.m. to close by 9 p.m., so self-employed business owners argue that the sales difference from a one-hour extension is much greater.

Jo Ji-hyun, head of the Emergency Measures Committee for the Self-Employed, said, "While the government claims to prioritize public convenience by lifting the quarantine pass for large marts and department stores, maintaining double or triple business restrictions on self-employed businesses can only be felt as oppression." He added, "Under policies that only demand sacrifices from the self-employed and small business owners, losses are snowballing, and with mounting pressure to repay loans, cases of giving up business altogether are increasing."

Some self-employed organizations have also announced plans for stronger responses. The Corona Victims Self-Employed General Solidarity, composed of 10 self-employed groups including the Korea Food Service Industry Association, stated, "Maintaining business hour restrictions despite no significant correlation between business hours and the increase in confirmed cases is an unreasonable act that ignores the plight of self-employed business owners," and announced a collective head-shaving event on the 25th. On internet communities where self-employed people gather, comments range from lamenting, "Department stores and marts were freed because large corporations pushed hard, and academies because parents protested loudly. Only powerless and fragmented self-employed people are being told to die," to calls for legal action, saying, "Instead of head-shaving or protests, let's file lawsuits against the government."

Meanwhile, a survey conducted by the Federation of Korean Industries targeting self-employed business owners nationwide the previous day found that 65.4% expect this year’s sales to decrease compared to last year, and 63.6% anticipate a decline in net profits.

The biggest difficulties self-employed business owners expect this year are "limitations in overall consumer sentiment recovery due to the prolonged COVID-19 pandemic" at 30.7%, followed by "limitations in offline sales improvement due to social distancing and business hour restrictions (22.9%)," "burden of rising material purchase costs due to inflation (12.0%)," "loan repayment burdens due to rising interest rates and maturity (10.1%)," and "increased rent and tax burdens (9.8%)."