Towards a 0% Start Rate: Stopping the Economy in the Name of Safety

If You’re Scared of Driving, Just Get Out and Push

One day, a strange scene unfolded on the road. Drivers are getting out of their cars and pushing them by hand. Why? Because if you drive and have an accident, you get punished. If you are holding the steering wheel, you can be held responsible for an accident at any time. But what if you get out and push? Since you aren’t driving, there are no driving accidents. You can also avoid punishment for traffic accidents. Isn’t it a perfect solution?

Of course, this is nonsense. You have to drive a car to get to your destination. If you get out and push, you won’t get anywhere. The cars following behind also have to stop. The roads become paralyzed, and everyone suffers losses. But right now, this is exactly what is happening in the South Korean construction industry.

South Korea is currently challenging itself to achieve a 0% construction start rate to reach a 0% industrial accident rate.

This is not a joke. If you start construction, accidents can happen. If an accident happens, the management executive gets punished. They could be detained, fined billions of won, or have their business suspended. So, what is the safest choice?

Not starting construction. If you don’t do construction, there are no accidents during construction. There are no violations of the Serious Accidents Punishment Act. 0% industrial accident rate, goal achieved.

Like a driver who gets out and pushes because they are scared of driving, the construction industry cannot pick up a shovel because they are scared of punishment. And the nation calls this an achievement of safety policy. How deceptive is this situation?

Stalled Sites, Collapsing Numbers

According to Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport Statistics, the nationwide construction start area in 2023 decreased by 31.7% compared to the previous year. It plummeted by 34.2% in the metropolitan area and 29.5% in the provinces. 75.678 million square meters. Compared to 135.668 million square meters in 2021, effectively 44% evaporated in just two years. While these figures alone are shocking enough, the story doesn’t end here.

Construction Trend Briefing No. 1030 released by the Construction & Economy Research Institute of Korea (CERIK) in November 2025 conveys an even grimmer reality. From January to August 2025, the cumulative construction start area decreased by an additional 16.0% year-on-year. We are falling from the basement, which we thought was the bottom, into an even deeper underground.

Construction completed value, meaning the amount of actual construction work done, plummeted by 18.5% during the same period. The monthly slump in completed construction began in May 2024 and has continued for 16 consecutive months, the longest period on record. It means the sites have stopped.

What about construction investment? According to Index Korea’s Construction Investment Trends, construction investment turned downward in 2024 after rebounding by 1.3% in 2023. The Bank of Korea lowered the 2024 construction investment growth rate from the initial -1.8% to -2.6%. CERIK forecasts that construction investment in 2025 will plummet by 8.8% year-on-year. Looking at it quarterly, it recorded -13.3% in Q1 2025, -11.4% in Q2, and -8.2% in Q3.

From permits to starts to investment, all leading and lagging indicators of the construction industry are simultaneously sending red signals. The South Korean construction industry is in an unprecedented situation of decline for 5 consecutive years from 2020 to 2024. This is not a simple business cycle. It is the collapse of an industry.

Jobs Disappearing: Rupture of the Weakest Link

When construction sites stop, people are the first to be hit. Specifically, the daily wage workers who are the most vulnerable in our society.

According to the August 2025 Employment Trends released by the National Data Agency, the number of employed persons in the construction industry decreased by 132,000 compared to the same month last year. This is a decline for 16 consecutive months. In the Ministry of Employment and Labor’s October 2025 Employment Trend Analysis, the decrease was 123,000, continuing the double-digit decline.

It’s not just about looking at the numbers. Statistics from the Construction Workers Mutual Aid Association show a more specific picture. The average age of construction workers has reached 53.1 years. People in their 40s or older account for about 80% of the total, while young people under 35 account for only 0.5%. The proportion of those in their 60s or older has exceeded 29%.

Construction has become an industry avoided by youth and sustained by the elderly. Heads of households in their 60s, who have delayed retirement and must come out to the sites to make a living, are being driven to the brink as sites stop. Where should they go if construction starts decrease? Are there other jobs that can replace these for them?

According to the Research Institute for Construction Policy, residential construction starts in Q1 2025 decreased by 56.8% year-on-year. Residential construction is the sector with the largest employment inducement effect. If starts are halved, jobs are halved. This is not arithmetic, but reality. While the government shouted for income-led growth, regulations were deleting jobs.

An Era Where You Get Punished for Driving

The Serious Accidents Punishment Act came into effect in January 2022. It was first applied to workplaces with 50 or more employees, and expanded to workplaces with 5 or more employees from January 2024. The purpose of the law was clear. To protect the lives and safety of workers and impose safety duties on business owners and management executives.

However, in the field, this law is working differently. According to the Comprehensive Measures for Industrial Safety released by the Ministry of Employment and Labor in September 2025, companies with repeated serious accidents are fined up to 5% of their operating profit, or a minimum of 3 billion won. If a business suspension is received twice within 3 years, construction registration can be cancelled. Participation in public bidding is also restricted.

The blade of punishment is becoming sharper. The Public Procurement Service is restricting participation in public projects for companies where serious accidents occur, and has begun to expand the application of demerit points for accident death rates to construction projects under 5 billion won. From a construction company’s perspective, doing construction creates risk, and not doing construction creates no risk. What is the rational choice?

“The most certain safety is doing nothing.”

This is the honest feeling of CEOs. CERIK diagnoses this as “high-intensity safety and labor regulations causing construction delays and cost increases, hindering the recovery of orders.”

According to a survey by the Korea Federation of SMEs, 61.2% of SMEs responded that the burden on management has increased since the enforcement of the Serious Accidents Punishment Act. 74.6% answered that they cannot reflect safety management costs in the unit delivery price. They don’t give money to invest in safety, but threaten to shut down the company if an accident happens. In this structure, is there any incentive for companies to actively start construction?

The Illusion That Accidents Have Decreased

Proponents of stronger regulations say that deaths have decreased because punishment has become stronger. Is that really true?

According to the Ministry of Employment and Labor’s industrial accident status statistics, total industrial accident deaths in 2024 were 589, a decrease from the previous year, entering the 500 range for the first time ever. Construction deaths also decreased from 402 in 2022 to 356 in 2023, and 328 in 2024. Looking only at the numbers, it seems like there is progress.

However, a closer look at Index Korea’s Industrial Accident Status reveals a different picture. As of the end of September 2025, the accident death rate per 10,000 workers was 0.30, an increase of 0.02 points year-on-year. The number of accident deaths was 675, an increase of 58 or 9.4% year-on-year. The total number of deaths was 1,735, an increase of 168 or 10.7% year-on-year.

What was the decrease in 2024 due to? Even the Ministry of Employment and Labor’s own analysis pointed to a decrease in construction volume due to the contraction of the construction economy as the main cause. Don’t be mistaken. It’s not that it became safer, but that fewer accidents occurred because less work was done. It’s like no traffic accidents happening because people got out of their cars and pushed. can this be called a policy achievement?

Let’s look at international comparisons. According to a report by CERIK analyzing the status of fatal accidents in the construction industry in OECD countries, as of 2017, the number of accident deaths per 100,000 workers in all industries in Korea was 3.61, 1.5 times the average of 2.43 for 35 OECD member countries. More serious is the construction industry. Considering only construction, Korea was 25.45, more than 3 times the OECD average of 8.29.

Is it because punishment is weak? In terms of sentencing alone, Korea is already at the highest level in the world. The problem is the system.

It’s Not Punishment, It’s System: Lessons from the UK

Safety is important. The lives of workers are more precious than anything else. There can be no disagreement on this point. The problem is the approach.

Current regulations focus on Ex-post Punishment. When an accident occurs, the management executive is arrested and fined. However, this approach has two fundamental limitations.

First, fear of punishment shrinks business. Instead of managing risk, it makes businesses give up on the business itself to completely block risk. Second, punishment does not prevent accidents. According to Heinrich’s Law, behind 1 serious disaster lie 29 minor disasters and 300 near-misses. Accidents are the result of structural problems such as incomplete systems at the site, tight schedules, and insufficient budgets. Arresting one management executive does not change that structure.

Let’s look at the UK case. The UK introduced the CDM (Construction Design and Management) regulations in 1994. The core of this regulation is not punishment, but Design.

When constructing a building, many of the causes of accidents are determined at the design stage. The UK imposes safety responsibilities on clients and designers as well. Experts called Principal Designers participate from the planning and design stages, warning “If constructed according to this design, there is a risk of workers falling” and having the design modified. It removes risk elements from the drawings, not the site.

According to a comparative study of overseas systems by the Korea Occupational Safety and Health Agency’s Occupational Safety and Health Research Institute, construction fatalities in the UK decreased dramatically after the introduction of CDM. Not because punishment was strengthened, but because the process changed. ‘Ex-ante Prevention’ of eliminating risks before accidents happen is a hundred times more effective than sending responsible persons to prison after accidents happen.

You Can’t Reach the Destination by Pushing: The Fear of a Supply Cliff

The decrease in construction starts is not just a problem for construction companies. It signifies a coming supply cliff. It takes 2-3 years to build an apartment. If we don’t start construction now, there will be no apartments to move into in 3 years.

A decrease in starts means a decrease in supply. A decrease in supply means a sky-rocketing in prices. Combining the 2026 housing market outlook from the Housing Industry Institute and CERIK, nationwide housing jeonse prices are expected to rise by 4.0%, and sales prices are expected to show a strong trend. It is a signal that the jeonse crisis is starting again.

According to CERIK, the cumulative volume of unstarted projects since 2023 amounts to 417,000 units. It means there are over 400,000 houses that have not been built. According to Index Korea’s Building Permit, Start, and Completion Status, building permit area also decreased by 25.6% year-on-year in 2023. Permits are a leading indicator of starts. The current sharp decline in permits and starts will lead to a more serious, disastrous supply shortage in 2-3 years.

If you get out and push the car, you can avoid accidents. But you will never reach your destination. If the construction industry stops, accidents can be reduced. But houses are not built, jobs disappear, and the housing cost burden on the common people explodes. Is this the result we wanted?

We Must Take the Wheel Again

If we have diagnosed the problem, we must also present a solution. Nothing changes with criticism alone.

1. Design Stage Safety Integration (K-CDM): How long will we only squeeze the contractors? Like the UK CDM regulations, we must give authority and responsibility to clients and designers as well, and introduce a system that secures safety from the design stage. Accidents disappear from the site only when risks are erased from the drawings.
2. Realization of Safety Costs: There is no such thing as a free lunch. Safety costs money too. It is a contradiction to demand the highest safety while cutting construction costs with the lowest bid. A system that separately calculates safety costs and settles them at actual cost must be mandated from public ordering.
3. Qualitative Transition of Regulation: The paradigm must change from ‘how much to punish’ to ‘how to prevent’. The punishment level of the Serious Accidents Punishment Act should be rationalized, and incentives for prevention efforts should be strengthened.
4. Introduction of Smart Construction Technology: Technology investment must be supported so that robots do dangerous high-altitude work and AI and digital twins handle complex management. Technology that keeps humans out of dangerous places, that is true safety.

Getting out and pushing the car because you are scared of driving is not a solution. Learning how to drive safely and making safe roads is the solution. Putting down the shovel because you are scared of starting construction is not a solution. Creating a system to build safely is the solution.

South Korea is challenging itself to a 0% start rate for a 0% industrial accident rate. This reckless challenge must not succeed. The dash towards a 0% start rate must stop immediately. It is time to take the wheel again and turn on the engine.

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