Editor’s note: The following article is an opinion piece by Chan Young Bang, the principal investigator at the DPRK Strategic Research Center. Views expressed in opinion articles are exclusively the author’s own and do not represent those of NK News.

North Korea’s sweeping new wage reform — billed as a bold step to revive socialism and dismantle the informal markets that have sustained its economy for decades — is not just economically unsound, but dangerously self-defeating, setting the stage for yet another failed experiment that could deepen poverty and trigger systemic collapse.

Beginning in late 2023, North Korea introduced