It Makes a Difference to the Sheep

FLYING YANGBAN FLOATS "AN IDEA THAT MAKES SO MUCH SENSE THAT IT WILL NEVER HAPPEN" Noting that the growing numbers of foreign workers in South Korea are presenting challenges to the ROK, he makes the following suggestion:

Thinking about this I had an epiphany; why doesn't the South Korean government invite some of their North Korean brothers and sisters to come down and work in these factories? After all, as bad as conditions can be in the plants they can't be as bad as those in parts of North Korea, can they?

If ever there was a case in which the two Koreans should cooperate, this is it. South Korean factory owners would benefit by having laborers who speak the same language as their managers. Using Northern workers in the South could also be a first step in joint development projects as workers trained in the South could become foremen on new South Korean-owned businesses in the North.

But the big winner would be the North. The cash-starved country could gain the remittances of hundreds of thousands of workers.

But then reality sets in:

As good an idea as it is to have North Koreans join their Korean-Chinese cousins in South Korean shops and factories, it will never happen, for the simple reason that opening up the Koreans to each other at that level will lead to the eventual overthrow of the North Korean dictatorship.