{
  "id": 2974223,
  "title": "'You can't remove heart from body': FSS, KDIC unions rally against relocation out of Seoul",
  "url": "https://urgent.news/2026/08/24/you-cant-remove-heart-from-body-fss-kdic-unions-rally-against-2974223",
  "topic": "business",
  "section": "Business",
  "published": "2026-08-24T08:07:03.000Z",
  "source": {
    "name": "The Korea Times",
    "slug": "the-korea-times-koreatimes",
    "url": "https://www.koreatimes.co.kr/economy/20260824/you-cant-remove-heart-from-body-fss-kdic-unions-rally-against-relocation-out-of-seoul"
  },
  "original_language": "en",
  "account": "The Korea Deposit Insurance Corporation (KDIC) and the Financial Supervisory Service (FSS) are the lifeblood of South Korea’s financial system. Yet, the government is proposing to uproot these critical institutions from Seoul, their heartland. Union leaders argue this would be akin to performing a heart transplant on a living body without anesthesia or a recovery room. Speaking outside Cheong Wa Dae in the searing heat, Kim Young-heon, head of the KDIC labor union, warned that relocating such vital agencies could have disastrous consequences for the nation’s financial stability. \"If you take the heart out of the body,\" he said, \"how can we expect it to function normally?\" Over forty union members from the KDIC and FSS rallied, holding red placards and protesting the government’s plan to transfer the institutions to Sejong, Korea’s administrative capital. This move is part of President Lee Jae Myung’s broader strategy to decentralize government agencies from Seoul, aiming to alleviate the region’s extreme population density.",
  "summary": "“The Korea Deposit Insurance Corporation (KDIC) and the Financial Supervisory Service (FSS) are the heart of Korea’s financial stability. And yet the government says it wants to move that heart away from the center of the financial markets. If you take out the heart and put it somewhere else, can you really expect the body to keep functioning normally?” The voice of Kim Young-heon, head of the…",
  "key_points": [],
  "editors_take": null,
  "illustration": null,
  "coverage": {
    "outlets": 2,
    "also_reported_by": [
      {
        "outlet": "The Korea Times",
        "title": "'You can't remove heart from body': FSS, KDIC unions rally against relocation out of Seoul",
        "url": "https://urgent.news/2026/08/24/you-cant-remove-heart-from-body-fss-kdic-unions-rally-against",
        "published": "2026-08-24T08:02:03.000Z"
      }
    ]
  },
  "ai_generated": true,
  "disclaimer": "Summaries, key points and the editor’s take are written by software from other outlets’ reporting and may contain errors — always check the linked original."
}