Lee Jae-myung Proposes Inheritance Tax Reform... ruling party says "Promotes Wealthy Tax Cut Frame"

On the 16th, the People Power Party responded to Lee Jae-myung, leader of the Democratic Party of Korea, criticizing the ruling party's inheritance tax reform plan by saying it "is fostering a frame of tax cuts for the rich."

Kwon Seong-dong, floor leader of the People Power Party, held a press conference at the National Assembly on the same day and stated, "South Korea's inheritance tax, which is excessively burdensome compared to international standards, is itself an excessive regulation and a factor threatening the future of businesses and the middle class."

Floor leader Kwon explained, "To address these issues, the government announced a tax law amendment including revisions to the Inheritance and Gift Tax Act in July last year," adding, "The core points are raising the child deduction from 50 million won per person to 500 million won and lowering the top tax rate from 50% to 40%."

Yonhap News

He pointed out, "On December 10 last year, the Democratic Party rejected the amendment to the Inheritance and Gift Tax Act," and criticized, "While Leader Lee only talks about corporate competitiveness, he is actually devoted to anti-business and anti-market legislation, condemning reasonable tax reforms for businesses as tax cuts for the rich and fostering class conflict."

Leader Lee, on his Facebook the day before, criticized the People Power Party's inheritance tax reform plan as "insisting on lowering the top tax rate," and said, "Only a few asset owners with tens of billions, hundreds of billions, or trillions of won benefit." Regarding the Democratic Party's inheritance tax reform plan, he wrote, "The current uniform deduction of 500 million won and spouse deduction of 500 million won are each increased to 800 million won and 1 billion won."

Meanwhile, when Floor Leader Kwon was asked whether the inheritance tax reform issue would be discussed at the upcoming National Assembly consultation scheduled for the 20th, he replied, "The agenda for the ruling party-opposition-government consultative body has not yet been finalized."

He added, "Even before lowering the inheritance tax rate, since the Democratic Party intends to expand the deduction limits, we are willing to discuss that part as much as needed."