This study examines the effects of the Serious Accidents Punishment Act (SAPA) on labor market outcomes to derive policy implications. SAPA was enacted in January 2021 and implemented in January 2022.

Chapter 2 summarizes the institutional structure and introduces key research questions. Specifically, this chapter reviews the legislative background, the structure of the law, early judicial trends, and existing literature on SAPA. Based on this review, I provide theoretical predictions regarding the effects of SAPA using a simple model where firms choose their level of safety investment and labor demand. The model predicts that while SAPA is likely to reduce accidents by increasing safety investment, it may simultaneously lead to a reduction in labor demand.

Chapter 3 analyzes data from an original firm-level survey to examine current situation of the Safety and Health Management Systems. I find that firms increased their safety investment following the implementation of SAPA. However, despite the quantitative expansion of safety investment, I find that the qualitative improvement of the Safety and Health Management Systems remains limited.

Chapters 4 through 6 present causal analyses of SAPA’s effects. In Chapter 4, I study the effects on the labor market for safety experts, a key input for safety investment. By applying Synthetic Difference-in-Differences (SDID) to observations from the Regional Employment Survey, I find that SAPA increased the employment of safety experts, with the effect growing from 2022 to 2024. However, the effect on wages was pronounced only in the short run; while SAPA increased wages in the second half of 2022, the effect became smaller and statistically insignificant by the second half of 2024, implying a highly elastic supply of safety experts.

Chapter 5 examines effects on workplace accident fatalities, the primary policy objective of SAPA. Using a Difference-in-Differences (DID) framework that exploits industry-level variation in exposure to SAPA, I find that the Act reduced three "traditional" types of workplace accidents: falls, crushes, and collisions. However, there is no evidence of significant effects on other accident types.

Chapter 6 investigates the effects of SAPA on labor demand for high-risk occupations. I combine information on occupation-level risk exposure and labor market outcomes using an empirical strategy in Continuous Treatment Difference-in-Differences framework. The results indicate that following the implementation of SAPA, employment levels in higher-risk occupations decreased relative to those with lower risk exposure.

Chapter 7 concludes the study by synthesizing the empirical findings and deriving policy implications.

Abstract
Preface
Summary (Korean)

Chapter 1 Introduction

Chapter 2 Major Contents of the Serious Accident Punishment Act and Derivation of Research Topics
　Section 1 Background of the Enactment of the Serious Accident Punishment Act
　Section 2 Key Contents and Judicial Precedent Trends of the Serious Accident Punishment Act
　Section 3 Existing Discussions on the Serious Accident Punishment Act
　Section 4 Theoretical Analytical Framework and Derivation of Research Topics

Chapter 3 The Serious Accident Punishment Act, Industrial Safety Status, and Corporate Perception
　Section 1 Overview of the Fact-Finding Survey
　Section 2 Sample Composition and Workplace Status
　Section 3 Status of the Safety and Health Management System and Changes Since the Enforcement of the Serious Accident Punishment Act
　Section 4 Perception of the Serious Accident Punishment Act
　Section 5 Determinants of Perception of the Serious Accident Punishment Act
　Section 6 Summary and Policy Implications

Chapter 4 The Impact of the Serious Accident Punishment Act on the Labor Market for Safety Management Personnel
　Section 1 Introduction of Research Questions
　Section 2 Data Introduction and Descriptive Analysis
　Section 3 Introduction of Empirical Analysis Strategy
　Section 4 Empirical Analysis Results
　Section 5 Summary and Policy Implications

Chapter 5 The Impact of the Serious Accident Punishment Act on the Occurrence of Fatal Accidents
　Section 1 Empirical Analysis Strategy and Data Introduction
　Section 2 Empirical Analysis Results
　Section 3 Robustness Check
　Section 4 Summary and Policy Implications

Chapter 6 The Impact of the Serious Accident Punishment Act on Labor Demand for High-Risk Occupations
　Section 1 Introduction of Research Questions
　Section 2 Data and Empirical Analysis Methodology
　Section 3 Empirical Analysis Results
　Section 4 Summary and Policy Implications

Chapter 7 Conclusion and Policy Recommendations
　Section 1 Summary of Empirical Analysis Results
　Section 2 Policy Implications

References
Appendix