The rising number of EV owners in Korea means more people are directly affected by charging costs. This post taps into a broader public sentiment against privatization of essential services and perceived government inefficiency, making it highly relatable and controversial.
Electric vehicle adoption is booming in South Korea, but a new debate is sparking outrage online: the high cost of EV charging. A recent post on a popular Korean forum is questioning the wisdom behind privatizing the nation's EV charging infrastructure, asking why a system plagued with problems was ever created in the first place. The original poster delves into the history, pointing out that privatization was touted as the solution to infrastructure issues. However, many Koreans now feel it has only led to exorbitant prices and a strange structure where "middlemen" โ private operators โ are allowed to 'insert a straw' and siphon profits from public funds, while consumers bear the brunt. The sentiment is that problems caused by public officials' inefficiency should be fixed by disciplining those officials, not by simply handing over essential services to the private sector, a move that's notoriously hard to reverse once done. Even the current government is reportedly aware of the issue's severity and aims to correct it, but the question remains: is it too late?
๐ฐ๐ท KOREAN REACTIONS 4
They're gonna delete this post too, aren't they?
They always justify it by saying 'we don't have enough money, so let's bring in private capital to build infrastructure and let them 'insert a straw' (siphon profits)'. But I really wish important stuff wasn't privatized. Public companies should just do their job properly! If they're short on cash, they should raise capital and pay dividends.
Why don't they just let private companies do their thing, and then the public sector can install affordable chargers? Public chargers are already setting the price standard, but honestly, they're not cheap at all.
Exactly. Privatizing Yukong's business is how we ended up with all these oil companies today.