I think you are right, it sounds like it was designed to make fat cats fatter and leave the young upstarts scrounging with year-by-year lecturer contracts. Reminds me of the constant “attracting outstanding foreign talent” mantra one hears and how the government will give them all kinds of benefits, etc, when they need it least.
The salary level of faculty in Taiwan is low by international standards. If you think otherwise, it is clear you have not served on a recruitment committee trying to persuade international candidates to come here to work.
Taiwan’s competitive advantage, as I see it, is very decent research funding by international standards. If however you don’t produce, you will not have it for long.
I would also qualify the statement by Gain that there are “not enough openings for young scholars seeking jobs.” Strictly speaking, this is untrue, as there are PLENTY of work opportunities out there. The problem is that the vast majority of these “opportunities” are so-called “part-time work” (in fact no such thing) with terrible pay, extremely limited benefits, and almost no security. This is the true scandal of the system and it needs to be named as such.
Guy
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I’ve had precisely the same offers. They find your email address through journal publications or information on the net about speeches you’ve given for university or government organizations. They offer free travel and over NTD 10,000 (minimum) per hour to share your research and training content at their universities. I universally refuse. They recognize our TW talent and usually want to steal or ideas and talent. I don’t look kindly on this strategy, as clever as it might be. In TW the speaker fees for profs or other experts is fine (honestly the most I’ve ever received was 8,000 for a 45 minute speech at a private uni).
Another example is a 學弟 who got a job as both Associate Professor and Department Head, since he was the only one there with an actual decent Ph.D. He, and his wife, couldn’t stand the lifestyle for over two years and moved to another country. One would be warned to be tempted by 426 offers in China.
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