Provided that unification costs are defined as all expenses or investments required for managing a unified Korea, they will include:
a) Expenditures for coping with emergency situations resulting from reunification;
b) Expenditures for achieving systemic unity of the two halves of Korea in all areas; and
c) Investments needed to secure the production infrastructure and various physical capital needed to raise the income level in the northern half of the unified peninsula up to one-half of the income level of the South.
What needs to be noted here is that the investments of the third category are for development of the backward economy in the northern half, which will lead to the accumulation of physical capital and national wealth of a unified Korea. Accurately speaking, this is investment, not cost, in terms of economics. However, this investment is compulsory, not the object of choice on the basis of cost-benefit analysis.