Since the implementation of the Consumer Protection Act in Korea, consumer policy has endeavored to protect the interests of consumers and improve consumer welfare. However, recent incidents of harm to consumers and the severity of the problem have become a growing threat to consumer safety. Consumers' expectations and their consciousness about their quality of life are rising as their income levels have grown, and national policy, which has hitherto supported rapid economic growth, is transforming into supporting sustainable economic growth. The time has come for new consumer policies to be set up to meet consumers’ demands. In recent years, it has also become increasingly urgent to develop consumer policies that minimize the damage of new problems facing consumers, as their living conditions rapidly change due to demographic changes, economic depression, and the characteristics of the fourth era of the Industrial Revolution. In this study, we will examine the major consumer policy commitments from the recent 18th presidential election and the campaign promises of the eventual 19th president, Moon Jae-in, and we will analyze the policy needs that academics and consumer organizations have demanded from the 19th government. The main purpose of this paper is to propose the direction and key tasks of consumer policy that should be promoted in the future. In light of the consumer policy commitments proposed in the 18th and 19th presidential elections and the aforementioned demands from academics and consumer groups, we present the following crucial tasks, in five areas, to undertake in order to realize effective consumer policies: First, the governance of consumer policy must be strengthened. In the current absence of a system for managing and coordinating consumer administration, the consumer administrative organization must become an independent, permanent organization that solves consumer problems. This organization should be mandated to oversee consumer affairs and promote leading policies. Second, local governments should activate consumer life centers, as municipalities in local areas should be the main entities that protect consumers. The most important basic aspect of residents’ lives is their role as consumers, and the state should support local governments in protecting that role. Thus, revitalizing local consumer life centers should be an important future consumer policy goal. Third, to strengthen consumers’ rights and sovereignty, their advocates in government should: establish a consumers’ rights promotion fund; introduce class action suits and a punitive damages system; convert responsibility for consumer attestation; and take other related measures. Fourth, to promote consumer safety, policies should include the following: establishing consumer safety law; providing consumer safety management administrators at local consumer life centers; improving safety policies for consumer goods by focusing on strengthening consumer-oriented safety management; and strengthening personal information protection. Fifth, to protect household economic stability and financial consumer protection, policy goals should include: creating jobs to generate sustainable household income; stabilizing household economies through financial policies that protect the common people and the vulnerable; and building consumers’ financial capacity. By recognizing, through our research, the structural problems that are obstacles to developing consumer policy, we suggest here the direction and core tasks of that policy that should be important to the present government. Our findings will contribute to establishing and managing a consumer policy system that will provide practical help to household and individual consumers.