Effort Years and Underperformance: The Intersection of Employment, Social Protection, and Gender in South Korea

This paper offers an unorthodox method to determine economic underperformance in relation to a state's desired social policy goals. The method measures what is referred to within as effort years in macroeconomic terms (EYm), and attempts to determine whether further studies on socio-structural factors that may be limiting labor force participation are warranted. It does this by comparing labor force participation across all available age groups between a state and corresponding benchmark state and then accounting for the efficiency of productivity. The results are expected to help policymakers generate a reasonable conclusion as to the increase in labor through higher employment rates and increased productivity, which are necessary to meet desired goals. In the case of South Korea, results show a considerable shortfall in effort years of productivity that could potentially contribute to economic growth and greater social protection outlays. Notably, more than 99% of South Korea's shortfall can be attributed to the state's gender gap in employment.