[Editorial] Time to consider designating city buses as essential public services

With the conclusion of labor-management negotiations for Seoul city buses, a "rush hour crisis" has been averted. It is fortunate that the union agreed to a 3.2% wage increase and withdrew its strike. However, citizens remain uneasy. This is because the conflict was merely papered over by postponing the highly contentious issue of "the standard hours for calculating regular wages."

The union demands that regular wages be calculated based on a monthly 176-hour standard. Seoul City counters that accepting the union's request would result in an additional annual fiscal burden of hundreds of billions of won. A large-scale increase in labor costs would inevitably lead to higher taxes or public utility fees, directly increasing the economic burden on citizens. Conversely, if buses go on strike whenever negotiations break down, the mobility of ordinary people would be paralyzed in an instant.

The citywide bus strike that took place over two days last January starkly demonstrated how a city becomes paralyzed when public transportation halts. On the first day of the strike, with city bus operations dropping to just 6–7% of normal levels, the morning commute turned into hell. Citizens stood at every bus stop, stamping their feet while waiting for buses that never arrived, and subway stations became uncontrollably overcrowded due to the surge in passengers. This nightmare, which completely shook the daily lives and livelihoods of ordinary people, proved that city buses are a core infrastructure essential for maintaining social functions.

To minimize harm to citizens, it is necessary to designate the city bus industry as an "essential public interest service" and regulate bus operations as "mandatory maintenance work," similar to railways, aviation, water supply, and electricity. As an essential public interest service, subways continue to operate more than half of their schedule even during strikes. The reason buses receive massive tax subsidies to cover deficits is precisely because of their public nature. Yet, the fact that there is no way to prevent them from halting all at once, unlike subways, represents a systemic contradiction. Seoul's quasi-public bus system was implemented for the first time nationwide in July 2004, and last year alone, 457.5 billion won in fiscal support funds were injected.

The labor side argues that buses do not need to be designated as essential public interest services because alternative transportation options exist. However, today's buses form an integrated public transportation network alongside subways. They are not merely in a substitute relationship but a complementary one; therefore, if bus operations cease, an unmanageable transportation vacuum will occur. For residents in areas without subway access or for early-morning workers such as environmental sanitation workers and security guards, buses are directly tied to their livelihoods.

While the legitimate rights of workers must be respected, it is equally important to free citizens from the anxiety that city functions could be paralyzed at any moment. To encourage labor and management to engage in dialogue with a spirit of mutual benefit and compromise rather than resorting to extreme measures like strikes, designating city buses as essential public interest services is an unavoidable task.