"Even if the Labor Standards Act is gradually expanded to workplaces with fewer than five employees, the industrial safety sector should be applied without discrimination as soon as possible."
President Lee Jae-myung met with the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions (KCTU) on the 10th and stated that there should be no provisions in the Occupational Safety and Health Act (OSHA) that exclude workplaces with fewer than five employees. His remarks are interpreted as signaling the need for comprehensive expansion of the safety law. The statement draws attention given that fatal industrial accidents have recently occurred more frequently at small workplaces with fewer than five employees than at large establishments. Six key provisions of the OSHA that do not apply to workplaces with fewer than five employees have created "safety blind spots" for employers, workers, and the government alike.
First are the regulations in Chapter 2, Section 1 on occupational safety and health management systems, and Section 2 on safety managers. Under these provisions, workplaces with fewer than five employees are not required to appoint occupational safety and health officers or supervisors. They do not need specialized personnel such as safety managers or health managers, nor are they required to prepare "occupational safety and health management regulations" that serve as guidelines for workplace safety. All responsibility for safety management rests solely on individual business owners rather than on systematic frameworks.
This is a "double-edged sword" that increases accident risks from the employer's perspective. If the business owner has high safety awareness, they can personally ensure thorough accident prevention measures. Conversely, if safety awareness is low, identifying accident risks becomes difficult, and prevention through manuals or inspection systems cannot be expected.
Chapter 3, which addresses safety and health education, also excludes workplaces with fewer than five employees. Regular safety and health education, training at the time of hiring, and training when work content changes—all mandatory for general workplaces—are not required and carry no penalties for non-compliance. Only special training for hazardous or dangerous work is required.
This Chapter 3 exemption is a decisive factor that increases accident risks for workers. This is because workers are often deployed to sites without sufficient awareness of potential hazards such as harmful substances, machinery, and equipment. If safety rules are not habitualized through training, essential safety measures such as wearing hard hats or connecting fall prevention devices are easily dismissed as "bothersome tasks" at worksites.
Article 47 on safety and health diagnosis, Article 50 on safety and health improvement plans, and Article 159 on requests for business suspension also do not apply to workplaces with fewer than five employees. As a result, government diagnoses to identify risk factors and improvement plan orders are not properly implemented at these small workplaces.
Labor groups point out that the exclusion of these provisions has weakened the government's administrative capacity for accident prevention and recurrence prevention. Without close government oversight, risks become entrenched at workplaces with fewer than five employees that lack safety capabilities. In fact, leaving matters to employer discretion has made these small workplaces a major cause of increasing fatal industrial accidents. According to the Ministry of Employment and Labor, 605 workers died in industrial accidents involving legal violations last year, an increase of 16 from the previous year. Deaths at workplaces with fewer than five employees (or construction projects worth 500 million won or less) rose by 22 to 174.
The fact that workplaces with fewer than five employees are not fully subject to the Labor Standards Act is also a structural cause of vulnerability to fatal industrial accidents. These workplaces have higher incentives for long hours and high-risk work that increase accident risks compared to other establishments. This is because they are exempt from regulations on working hours, holidays and leave systems, and dismissal procedures, allowing employers to compel labor. Furthermore, workplaces with fewer than five employees have union organization rates below 0.1%, placing workers in a structure where speaking up about safety prevention activities is virtually impossible.
