[News Space=Reporter seungwon lee] The symbol of Korean manufacturing: Hyundai and Kia Motors factories. The workers there are called “new production workers” with hundreds of millions of won in annual salaries, but behind the splendid facade, there are industrial accidents, occupational diseases, and the tears of subcontracted workers.

Even more shocking is the tyranny of Hyundai and Kia Motors, which evades all responsibility with their powerful power and capital.

Over the past five years, more than 2,061 people were injured, and 28 people lost their lives… “Passing responsibility to subcontractors” becomes official

In the past five years, 2,061 workers at Hyundai and Kia Motors factories were injured or became ill due to industrial accidents, and 28 people lost their lives. 70% of the industrial accident deaths were subcontracted workers belonging to partner companies.

Many of them are victims of occupational diseases caused by accidents where their hands got caught in machines, were crushed by heavy parts, or were exposed to repeated noise and hazardous substances. In particular, more than 2,500 people at the Ulsan factory were diagnosed as having noise-induced hearing loss in the past five years. This is the result of long-term exposure to extreme noise on the automobile production line.

Four Jeonju plant painting workers were diagnosed with blood cancer due to exposure to hazardous chemicals such as benzene and formaldehyde. Although the Industrial Safety and Health Act strictly regulates the management of hazardous substances, there are still many cases where basic safety measures are neglected at the site, such as not wearing protective gear, lack of ventilation, and lack of safety education.

Behind these repeated industrial accidents, the shadow of the ‘subcontracting structure’ looms large. Hyundai-Kia Motors has formalized a strategy of shifting responsibility for safety management to subcontractors and blaming accidents on “individual negligence.” In November 2024, three researchers died in the Hyundai Motor Ulsan plant chamber suffocation accident, but the responsibility was transferred to the subcontractor. The testimony of a subcontractor worker who said, “I just did what the main contractor told me to do” proves this.

A Hyundai Motors subcontractor worker left an anonymous testimony, saying, “Even when subcontractors ask the company for safety measures, they only repeat the words ‘directions from the main contractor.’ It’s our fault even if we die.”

A fine of 3 billion won in the US, a ‘soft’ punishment in Korea… “Privilege of large corporations with power behind them”

A fine of 3 billion won was imposed when a Hyundai-Kia subcontractor died in Alabama in 2016. The US Occupational Safety and Health Administration warned Hyundai-Kia, saying, “The pressure on supply costs put workers at risk.”

However, in Korea, 23 people died after the implementation of the Serious Accident Punishment Act, but not a single case was prosecuted. Even when violations of the Industrial Safety and Health Act (OSHA) are discovered, most are punished at the level of a fine. The prosecution dismissed the death accident at Hyundai Motors’ Jeonju plant in 2024, saying, “It was a fulfillment of safety obligations.” The maximum fine of 50 million won for violation of the Industrial Safety and Health Act is less than 0.0001% of Hyundai and Kia’s sales.

Labor groups and experts point out that “since there is no real punishment for large corporations, the law is completely ignored even in the workplace. Productivity and speed are prioritized over safety.”

“A monthly salary of 10 million won is a life allowance that is exchanged for death… We work in contact with death every day.”

Out of the average annual salary of 96 million won for Hyundai Motor production workers, 40% is overtime and performance pay. Workers are forced to perform dangerous work without safety devices under pressure to “finish quickly.” In the Ulsan plant, 2,500 people were diagnosed with noise-induced hearing loss over a period of 5 years, and 4 paint workers at the Jeonju plant developed blood cancer due to exposure to carcinogens.

In 2011, a female worker at Hyundai Motor Company’s Asan plant filed for industrial accident compensation for mental illness, but the company dismissed it as a “personal matter.”

Hyundai Motor Company and Kia Motors avoid responsibility in the event of an industrial accident by verifying CCTV footage, destroying evidence, and threatening the bereaved family. In November 2024, the company claimed that the “exhaust gas leak warning system must have been activated,” but the equipment had been out of order for three years. This fact was also revealed by the Ministry of Labor’s investigation, but the CEO was not indicted. This is a structure where the calculation that “the cost of accident recovery is cheaper than legal punishment” is at work.

“We need workers’ cries against the tyranny of capital.”

Kim Cheol-joong, an industrial safety expert, criticized, “Hyundai Motor Company and Kia Motors’ ‘risk outsourcing’ strategy is being carried out at the expense of the lives of subcontracted workers,” and “the law has become a shield for large corporations.” He continued, “In a subcontracting structure, industrial accidents will not decrease unless the primary contractor actually takes responsibility for safety. We need to change our perception that safety is competitiveness.”

A labor official also said, “If legal punishment is too lenient, productivity will have to take priority over safety at large companies. The government and the National Assembly must strengthen effective punishment and on-site supervision.”

The industrial accident at Hyundai-Kia Motors is not a simple ‘accident.’ It is a murder caused by capital’s greed. It is no longer a matter of ‘individual mistake’ or ‘bad luck.’ Unless we remove the structural and repetitive risks, tears of subcontractors, and the shadow of occupational diseases, another disaster can happen at any time.

The records of Hyundai Heavy Industries, where 388 people died over 50 years, and Hyundai-Kia Motors, where 28 people died and 2,000 people were injured over 5 years, are a disgrace to the history of labor in the Republic of Korea.

It is time for both Hyundai-Kia management and our society to face the fact that the true meaning of ‘new production’ begins with a safe workplace.

Unless we overturn the structure of “risk goes to subcontractors, profits go to the main contractor,” Hyundai-Kia’s factories will continue to return to the conveyor belt of death.