- Rep. Hwang Hee suggests on Facebook: "Convert scrapped buses at 50 million won each to provide short-term housing"
- Online and youth backlash: "You wouldn't put your own daughter in a bus, but other people's children?"
- People Power Party joins criticism: "Insulting the youth without providing proper housing supply"
- Post deleted as controversy grows… Mocked as a misstep amid bipartisan housing supply disputes
Rep. Hwang Hee, a three-term veteran of the main opposition Democratic Party, retracted his proposal within a day after facing fierce criticism from the youth and the public for suggesting that scrapped buses be remodeled into youth housing spaces. Critics slammed the idea as a textbook case of "desk administration" and an "insult to the youth" that ignores the reality of young people suffering from jeonse (lump-sum housing deposit) fraud and loan burdens.
Rep. Hwang, a member of the National Assembly's Land, Infrastructure and Transport Committee, took to social media on the 7th to propose introducing "mobile bus houses" in South Korea, citing houseboats in Amsterdam, Netherlands, as an example. His logic was that by estimating remodeling costs at 50 million won per vehicle and investing 500 billion won for 10,000 households, the government could overcome the limitations of slow housing supply caused by high dependence on the private sector and rapidly provide short-term temporary housing to young people.
However, shortly after the proposal was made public, intense criticism erupted, particularly centered around online communities and the youth generation. Netizens expressed frustration, arguing that treating youth like refugees was unacceptable. Some real estate communities brought up an incident from last year where then-Policy Office Chief Kim Yong-beom resisted a question asking if he would recommend public rental housing to his own daughter, pointing out the hypocritical housing perceptions of the political circle.
The opposition party also went on the offensive. People Power Party Senior Spokesperson Park Choong-kwon directly criticized the idea, stating that telling young people to live in remodeled scrapped buses without any practical housing supply measures is a clear insult to the younger generation.
As the fallout grew, Rep. Hwang deleted the post and attempted to defuse the situation by explaining that it was purely an idea intended for those living in poor environments such as gosiwon (officetel-style single rooms). However, analysts note that at a time when the Democratic Party leadership has been strongly arguing that Seoul Mayor Oh Se-hoon and the People Power Party are responsible for Seoul's housing supply cliff crisis, an unpolished measure announced by a veteran lawmaker of the party has instead provided the opposition with ammunition for a counterattack.