▲ Representatives of Seoul's city bus companies and unionized bus workers shake hands before holding wage negotiations at the Seoul Regional Labor Relations Commission on Sept. 15, 2026. (Yonhap)

(ATTN: RECASTS headline, lead with strike plan; ADDS details in paras 2-4)

SEOUL, Sept. 15 (Yonhap) -- The union representing Seoul city bus workers said Tuesday it will launch a general strike starting with the first buses the following morning after wage talks with management ended without an agreement.

The labor and management held their second round of mediation talks at the regional labor relations commission in the day, but their eight-hour mediation talks failed to produce a breakthrough, according to the union.

Accordingly, the union plans to begin the strike at 4 a.m. Wednesday as threatened earlier. About 7,000 city buses operated by 64 companies run on roughly 390 routes in Seoul.

The Seoul city government said it will implement emergency transportation measures in response to the strike, including deploying up to 1,500 free shuttle buses to and from subway stations and increasing subway services during rush hours.

Unionized city bus workers and bus companies have been locked in a dispute over how to calculate the hourly wage rate after including regular bonuses in ordinary wages.

The union has called for calculating ordinary wages based on 176 monthly work hours and raising wages by 7.85 percent. However, bus companies and the Seoul city government have rejected the demand, saying the proposed calculation would effectively result in a wage increase of approximately 16 percent.

Yoo Jae-ho, deputy secretary-general of the Seoul Bus Workers' Union, said in a press briefing that the union is not insisting on a 7.85 percent wage increase and is willing to reach an agreement if the 176 monthly work hour standard is recognized.

"Some other regions have implemented wage increases of over 5 percent so we can use that as a benchmark to narrow the gap. We are not going on strike simply because we cannot lower the rate by even 0.1 percentage point," Yoo said.

He also refuted the management's claim that accepting the union's demands would raise bus drivers' annual salaries to 85 million won (US$62,500), saying their average annual salary is estimated at 59 million won this year.

City buses in Seoul and other big cities nationwide are operated under a semi-public management system, in which bus companies are in charge of bus operations and the municipal governments cover their losses.

The Seoul city government estimates that a 1 percent wage increase would result in approximately 14 billion won in additional annual costs and that accepting all of the union's demands could double the city bus system's annual deficit to about 1 trillion won.

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