Lee administration boosts cash-assistance budgets despite inadequate performance reviews

[Financial News] Some of the Lee Jae Myung administration’s flagship projects are set to receive substantial budget increases without proper performance evaluations, it has been confirmed. Despite being large-scale projects receiving funding ranging from several hundred billion to several trillion won, they were not subjected to a thorough review. Prominent examples include the Rural Basic Income and Youth Culture and Arts Pass programs, allocated 1.1657 trillion won and 792.527 billion won, respectively. The National Assembly Budget Office (NABO) has also said they require careful review.
An analysis by Financial News on the 4th of a report by the National Assembly Budget Office found numerous cases in which budgets for 2027 were substantially increased without a proper evaluation of the projects’ performance in the previous year. There were also many cases in which budgets were expanded despite low budget execution rates or inadequate project performance.
A prominent example is the Rural Basic Income program, which President Lee Jae Myung personally said he was “confident that it is efficient.” In 2026, the government ran a pilot program, investing about 861 billion won to provide Local Love Gift Certificates worth at least 150,000 won a month to residents in 17 rural areas. The government plans to expand the program to 35 counties in 2027.
The Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs is conducting research to evaluate the performance of areas participating in the pilot program, but the program’s coverage was substantially expanded before the evaluation was completed. The National Assembly Budget Office said, “Substantially expanding the pilot program’s coverage before the performance evaluation is complete could undermine the credibility of the basic income performance evaluation scheduled for late 2027,” adding, “It appears necessary to review this carefully.”
The Youth Culture and Arts Pass, which is set to receive 792.527 billion won, is a similar case. The previous government ran a program providing points worth 100,000 to 150,000 won to people aged 19 to 20 to support their cultural lives. The government plans to expand eligibility to those aged 19 to 34. As a result, the allocated budget has surged 22-fold from the previous year’s 36.1 billion won.
Criticism has been raised that the budget was hastily increased despite poor execution of the existing program. Concerns have also been voiced that the benefits are concentrated in the Seoul metropolitan area and that, contrary to the program’s original purpose, spending is focused on genres more popular with general audiences rather than foundational and fine arts. In particular, the execution rate was just 24.9% in 2024, 39.0% in 2025, and 27.2% as of August 2026, prompting calls for a close review of whether the budget can be spent as planned.
The National Assembly Budget Office also raised the need to adjust the scale of the “Startup for Everyone” project, whose budget was increased from 286.1 billion won to 441.1 billion won. The project was newly launched in 2026 and is scheduled to wrap up in January 2027. In other words, a full-fledged evaluation of its performance is effectively impossible. The office therefore says caution is needed before substantially expanding the scale of support.
[email protected] Lee Hae-ram Reporter