By Ria Jain
In an agreement with the union established in Korea, Hyundai Motors has decided to give bonuses of 2 trillion won to its Korean employees, even with the company facing unending challenges due to the high tariffs levied by the U.S Government. The news is based on the reports of the English publication of Maeil Business newspaper Korea- Pulse.
As per the agreement, the employees will receive an increase of 1,00,000 won in the base wage, a performance bonus that would be equal to 450% of the base and in addition a lump sum amount of 15.8 million won along with 30 shares of Hyundai Motors. The average base wage of 4 Million won will allow each individual employee to have incentives of about 40 Million thus making the company’s total payout to be around 2.5 trillion won as calculated for the 63,000 employees of Hyundai. This amounts to about 40% of the company’s net profit that is calculated at 6.63 trillion won as of the first half year. The agreement also talked about the union’s demand for job security where both the sides agreed to internalise their productions of six-speed transmissions and targeted a mass production by 2027 end.
The union also suggested expansion of the in-house production of components of electric vehicles like batteries. This may be an attempt to reassign the workers and bring them job security as there is a fall in the demand of combustion engines and transmissions. There is also an agreement to train software specialists that will help with the industry’s segue into software run vehicles.
The central labor council will vote on this deal in their general meeting on 15th September, 2025 and if rejected, strikes may follow. Further, Seoul and Washington have considered lessening the tariffs percentage from 25 to 15 per cent but a final say from President Trump stands pending. In addition to this, the delays in completing the company’s plant at Georgia because of the local Korean staff being detained may obstruct the supply of batteries in the U.S market.