Editorial Articles

Chun, H. (2023). Reduced corporate tax rate and flat tax system application: Economic policies that south korean political parties should support to enhance the livelihood of the people [Editorial Article Part 1 and Part 2]. Korea Agenda Forum. https://kaforum.modoo.at/?messageNo=7&mode=view&query=&queryType=0&myList=0&page=1%C2%A0%3E&link=mxrd8bdq https://kaforum.modoo.at/?messageNo=8&mode=view&query=&queryType=0&myList=0&page=1%C2%A0%3E&link=mxrd8bdq

 

This article claims that South Korean political parties must endeavor to impose low and flat corporate tax rate policies that can aid the nation in attaining economic development. The article utilizes the OECD data to state that South Korea is one of the few nations that applies a progressive tax on firms and has high corporate tax rates compared to the average OECD countries, even though the tax rate fell in 2023. It mentions that companies in South Korea will be less likely to invest in assets, conduct research and development, and improve their productivity. These will decrease the competence of South Korean firms and increase the unemployment rate, which negatively affects the nation’s economy. The current policies not only harm South Korea but also the global economy since they indirectly restrict foreign direct investment. Although the Minjoo Party of Korea, whose political ideology is related to raising tax revenue to help economically disadvantaged people, condemns implementing these policies by highlighting that these can result in a decrease in tax revenue and negatively affect welfare provision, the article emphasizes that this problem can be prevented if politicians spend tax revenues more efficiently than the present.

 

Working Papers

Chun, H. (2023, November). What factors determine china to continue to fight in the semiconductor war with the u.s.?. (Institute for Political & Economic Alternatives Working Paper No. 28). https://alternative.house/alternative-issue-paper-no28/

 

 

The paper examines what make the Chinese president continue to achieve semiconductor sector advancement plans, a cause of the semiconductor war, notwithstanding the United States (U.S.) export controls and foreign direct investment (FDI) restriction policies. The previous literature analyzes former President Trump’s intention to wage a trade war and the influence of the U.S. tariff barrier on China’s overall economy. However, this paper provides new information to the political economy field by studying President Xi’s aim to stick to the nation’s technology plan by estimating the impact of the U.S. non-tariff trade barriers on  China’s semiconductor field and predicting whether the semiconductor war will continue.

The paper creates the Chinese president’s political power maintenance theory. The theory emphasizes that President Xi maintains his political power by gaining support from Chinese citizens and political elites due to the country's political structure. Chinese citizens and political elites evaluate the presidential performance based on the nation’s economic condition during his regime and the degree to which the president keeps his promises that are considered important to the political elites, including the goal of achieving the country's technological development. The paper tests the theory by creating two hypotheses: 1) when compared to the Obama presidency, the China's integrated circuits (ICs) imports, semiconductor equipment imports, and inward foreign direct investment in the semiconductor sector will not show a downward trend during the Trump presidency and 2) there will be progress in increasing the nation’s ICs localization ratio and semiconductor sector technology advancement during the Trump administration. The paper tests the first hypothesis using the 2013 to 2020 data on the value of China’s ICs imports, semiconductor equipment imports, inward foreign direct investment in the semiconductor sector from Chip 4 alliance nations and estimates the yearly changes. The second hypothesis is tested by calculating the annual changes in China’s IC localization ratio utilizing 2013 to 2020 information and examining documents demonstrating the technological breakthroughs made in the semiconductor sector that China achieved during the Trump presidency.

The results show that these hypotheses are correct and support the theory. The paper also predicts that the technology war will continue because it is difficult for the U.S. government to create more effective policies that further discourage China from achieving its technology enhancement goals due to the opposition from the U.S. domestic semiconductor manufacturers. These workers claim that implementing these policies may further generate market uncertainty and China’s retaliation, such as China’s export controls of crucial semiconductor materials, which hampers the U.S. semiconductor sector.   

 

Theses

Chun, H. (2022). What factors shape the sectoral allocation of south korea's bilateral oda grants? [Unpublished undergraduate thesis]. Syracuse University. 

 

The paper studies the factors determining the sectoral allocation of South Korea’s bilateral Official Development Assistance(ODA) grants. Past studies have examined the common features of recipient nations that receive more ODA grants than others and the impact of the domestic politics of donor countries on foreign aid allocation. This paper is crucial to the political economy field since it not only analyzes the elements that influence South Korea’s bilateral ODA grants sectoral allocation within and between regimes but also shows how the nation’s imperfect democracy indirectly impacts the ODA grants sectoral allocation.

Since South Korea has a legacy of being a monarchy and authoritarian state, the paper relies on South Korea’s incomplete democracy theory, which is composed of 1) the imperial and democratic presidency theory and 2) the theory of lack of salient political ideology differences shown in policies made by conservative and liberal administrations. The hypothesis for the former theory is that the higher the number of government promises which are related to a specific ODA grants sector, the higher the amount of ODA grants will be allocated to that sector within the regime. The hypothesis to test the latter theory is when grouping the same ODA grants sectors from different regimes into one group and creating five distinct groups, which are health, education, public administration, technology energy and environment, and agriculture forestry and fisheries, the dissimilarities between each group in terms of receiving the percentage of ODA grants is influenced more by the general feature of ODA grants provisions, such as the recipient’s needs or donor’s interest, than the government promises which includes the political ideology. Utilizing the STATA, the paper conducts a multiple linear regression study, and the dependent variable is operationalized as the percentage of ODA grants allocated to five ODA grants sectors in 1999, 2004, 2009, 2014, and 2018. The independent variable for the former hypothesis is the number of government promises related to a specific ODA grants sector and is operationalized as a percentage of a government promise associated with a particular sector. The independent variables for the latter hypothesis are dummy variables calculated by grouping the same sectors from five regimes into one group and comparing each sector’s percentage of government promises associated with the sector and the percentage of the ODA grants it receives with the agriculture forestry and fishery sector’s. The paper also adds Development Assistance Committee (DAC) membership and political ideology dummy variables, which are given 1 for the year South Korea became a DAC member and the year a liberal administration ruled, respectively. The results illustrate that South Korea's incomplete democracy theory is correct.

This thesis was formulated in Humanitarian Action in World Politics PSC 435 senior capstone class in April 2022.