Kim Seong-jin, Gwangju Gwangsan Preliminary Candidate, Sixth Pledge Keyword 'Small Business Owners'

'Small Business Hope Project'... Easing Burdens and Establishing a Supportive Foundation

Measures to Develop Online Market Channels and Drastically Alleviate Debt Will Be Pursued

Kim Seong-jin, the Democratic Party preliminary candidate for the Gwangsan-gu (Eul) electoral district in Gwangju Metropolitan City, announced his sixth pledge, the ‘Small Business Hope Project’.

Candidate Kim stated, “With high exchange rates, high interest rates, and high prices, the economy for ordinary people is worsening day by day, and disasters like COVID-19 have pushed small business owners and self-employed individuals to the brink,” adding, “I promise to ease the burdens of small business owners and self-employed individuals, who account for about one-third of employment in our country, and to establish a foundation that can support them.”

He continued, “We will create a new policy to apply the income deduction rate for credit card usage, which was applied to traditional markets, to credit card usage by small business owners as well, contributing to increased sales,” and said, “We will expand the budget to support online sales for individual small business owners and create joint online markets by local commercial districts to support market development.”

He also emphasized, “Small business owners and self-employed individuals have been surviving day by day with debt,” and stressed, “We need to devise drastic measures to alleviate the debts of self-employed individuals.”

Furthermore, he explained, “We will expand the size of the New Start Fund to strengthen support such as principal reduction, interest reduction, and extension of repayment periods,” and added, “We will establish a specialized institution to operate the currently dispersed debt programs for small business owners and self-employed individuals to systematically manage the scale of insolvency.”

He then proposed, “To make it easier for self-employed individuals to try again, we will increase support for closure costs and introduce support funds to help with reemployment and re-challenge,” and suggested, “We will introduce sickness benefits for small business owners and self-employed individuals who cannot afford to rest even when sick, restoring their right to rest and health rights.”