"먹었어." 아들에게 거짓말하고 무료급식 한 끼로 버티는 70대

73-year-old Kim Young-soo stands in line in front of the welfare center every day at 11 a.m. He is going to receive a free meal. For 35 years, he tied rebar at construction sites. He built twelve apartment buildings in Seoul. He constructed three bridges. He built four schools. He is a man who has never once asked anyone for help. After his wife passed away from lung cancer, his 14 million won severance pay vanished entirely into medical and funeral expenses. The money remaining in his bank account was 2,340 won. His National Pension is 620,000 won. After paying rent and deducting fixed expenses, he is left with 87,000 won a month. He has to live on less than 3,000 won a day. His refrigerator stopped working after 15 years. Lacking the money to buy a new one, he keeps kimchi in a Styrofoam box filled with ice. His son is unaware of this. He calls every week. "Dad, have you eaten?" "Yes, I have. I cooked and ate soybean paste stew." It is a lie. He claims that he cooked the soybean paste stew he ate at the free meal service himself. He has been telling that lie for over a year. The free meal service was closed for four days during the Lunar New Year. He survived for four days on two packets of ramen and kimchi. He told his son, "I ate rice cake soup with the neighbors." His granddaughter said, "Grandpa, please buy me galbi next time." "Okay. I'll buy it for you next time." He has no money to buy galbi. Still, he said it. Why has a man who lived his entire life without ever asking others for help become unable to even ask his son for a single meal? It took him 35 years to reach this point in line. Currently, there are approximately 2.2 million elderly people aged 65 or older living alone in Korea. While the average monthly National Pension payout is around 650,000 won, the minimum cost of living for old age has been found to be 1.39 million won per month. Pensions alone cannot even cover half of that. The poverty rate for the elderly aged 65 and older is the highest among OECD countries, and over 3,900 cases of lonely deaths occur annually. #FreeMeal #ElderlyPoverty #ElderlyLivingAlone #NationalPension #Lie #73YearsOld #3000WonADay #Father #LookAtThis #OldAge #Pension #ConstructionWorker #RebarWorker #Semi-basement #MealTray #SoybeanPasteStew