비정규 이주 감소를 위한 외국인 고용허가제의 개선방안

Abstract

This paper analyzes various policy options for reducing irregular migration under the employment permit system. For this purpose, this paper investigates causes of irregular migration and policy options for reducing irregular migration in each step of migration process. To minimize irregular migration, choosing the right sending countries with lower irregular migration rate and higher employers' satisfaction rate is important. Thus in the process of revising the MOUs with sending countries, Korea has to adjust the number of sending countries to the optimal level from current ten countries which are beyond efficiently manageable. The Korean Employment Permit System is a demand-driven system. Thus Korea has to develop effective system to select right qualified migrant workers in the process of recruiting candidates based on the demand of employers. Korea also develop evaluation and monitoring system on the each step of process of the Employment Permit System including recruiting and immigration, managing employment and stay, protecting human rights of migrants, controlling illegal stayers, etc. In managing Employment Permit System, it is quite effective in minimizing irregular migration to use economic incentives to migrant workers and employers by raising economic returns to regular migration and costs of irregular migration. International cooperation to promote voluntary return in both sending and receiving countries is important as well.