President Lee Jae Myung speaks at a senior secretaries meeting at Cheong Wa Dae on Thursday. [Yonhap]
President Lee Jae Myung speaks at a senior secretaries meeting at Cheong Wa Dae on Thursday. [Yonhap]

President Lee Jae Myung is hosting a forum with youth policy experts Friday in a bid to win back young voters.

Cheong Wa Dae said Lee will hold a "youth policy expert forum for a great transformation in youth policy" at the presidential office Friday afternoon.

The office said the event was organized "to raise the effectiveness of youth policy by diagnosing problems — including the low real-world impact of existing measures — and to discuss ways to overhaul the overall administration to be more youth-friendly."

Eleven youth policy experts are set to attend, including Seo Bok-gyeong, civilian vice chairperson of the Youth Policy Coordination Committee; Kim Jong-jin, director of the Working Citizens Research Institute; Jeong Se-jeong, a research fellow at the Korea Institute for Health and Social Affairs; and Shin Jin-wook, a professor at Chung-Ang University. From Cheong Wa Dae, Chief of Staff Kang Hoon-sik, Policy Director Kim Yong-beom and Kim Tae-won, the youth and future secretary appointed July 16, are expected to join.

The forum will open with remarks by Lee, followed by presentations from four experts on the transformation of youth policy and a group discussion.

Lee has made several youth-related statements in recent weeks. On Saturday, he wrote on X, formerly Twitter, that "it must never happen that young people hesitate to get married because of government policy," pledging that the government would "fulfill its responsibility so that marriage can be a hopeful new beginning rather than a burden" — a reference to what has been called the "marriage penalty."

At a senior secretaries meeting he chaired on Thursday, Aug. 6, Lee said young people "are becoming almost a vulnerable class" and called for an active review of restructuring youth policy around "the core areas of young people's lives — education and employment, income and assets, housing and marriage."

Lee's moves are widely seen as a response to a recent deterioration in his approval ratings among young people. A National Barometer Survey conducted by Macromill Embrain, KStat Research, Korea Research and Hankook Research from Monday through Wednesday — covering 1,001 people aged 18 and older and released Thursday — showed positive ratings of just 31 percent among those in their 20s or younger and 40 percent among those in their 30s, both below half. That compares with an overall positive rating of 49 percent. The figures were the lowest across all age groups — lower even than the 45 percent recorded among those in their 60s and 44 percent among those 70 and older, age groups that also fell below 50 percent, while those in their 40s and 50s exceeded that threshold. (The survey was conducted via telephone interviews using virtual mobile numbers, with a response rate of 20.4 percent. For details, visit the National Election Survey Deliberation Commission website.)

Friday's forum is expected to take up a range of measures, including addressing the marriage penalty. Cheong Wa Dae said it plans to "diagnose current youth policy based on the forum's findings and review the budget, administrative and communication frameworks to improve the real-world effectiveness of youth policy."


moone@heraldcorp.com