31% of Taiwanese earn less than NT$30,000; 10% earn over NT$61,000 per month

Taiwan Living in Taiwan
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Have you been back to TW since and talked to locals? The economy is doing good for the elite yes and all your stats about the economy doesnt filter down. The elite are now sitting on piles of cash from record profits but for everyday people… I dont think anyone believes that here. Been living in Taipei for 6 yrs now. I can tell you havent lived here since the 90s lol we wouldnt be having this discussion ask any local. Its a different world/mentality than the TW of the 1990s.

BTW besides living here, I also am tied to the economy here since Im an employer in the Tech industry, Ive hired designers and engineers from HTC, Hong Hai, Renbao, so I hear all their stories I talk to HR I read endless articles and I know very well what each person makes in diff professions with bonus incldued and how hard they work how much people pay for rent, how much they can save or how hopeless they are. If anything there is overwhelming resentment from the youth about the additude of the 1990s as none of it has filtered to them…they sure arent able to buy a house, get married, have kids, save for retirement or have a car.

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Always nice to be enlightened about Taiwan’s situation by an armchair economist sitting in the US

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Where did I say the economy is doing good???

If you look at the numbers, it’s been anemic since about 2012.

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forgive me, I was just ranting

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no problem

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A good meaure of reality are the “investment” mosquito halls that keep on cropping up…over the remains of poor people’s affordable housing sites. Where do those people go? They dissappear off the radar, into 20 people 20 ping basements with no bathroom and no escape route in case of fire.

But that is the free market, you say. Well, not really. It si not free market if you use your government influence to kick people out, set up laws greyishly or in your favor… or just let loose your mafia connections.

yesterday I was watching an interesting report about trust in teh government and wealth distribution. It is s a cycle. When ther eis more equal wealth distribution, the people trust the government, it has the power then to enact actions that ensure wealth distribution. In turn, people trust it more as the conomy prospers. On the contrary, a government that is not trusted by its people has little power to enact changes or its authority, so there is more corruption and more inequality, hence less trus and so on.

There is a very informative cartoon where you have 3 people of different heights trying to watch a match. Ther eis a barrier in front of them. You can provide boxes to help them all enjoy the match…or you can remove teh barrier all together.

Currently, Taiwan has many barriers set by an elite that is clinging desperately to economic power,. Due to its ineptutude and greed, shortsightness and racism, they are in a losing, bleeeding money. So they exert this pressure ove rthe little people. When they refuse higher slaries they know they set in motion a machinery that keeps them in place. Otehrwise, their power may be contested.

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427

You exaggeration is borderline comical.

Unable to buy a house? In Taipei yes. Some (late 30s) end up buying in other places like Taoyuan or Taichung.
They aren’t elites. I am sick of those who are dumb enough to believe that it’s easy to buy a house anywhere, except in America. Just open your eyes. No one in their 20s or 30s are buying an apartment in other countries. The price-income ratio is equally bad in most big cities and worse in many.

Plenty of ppl get married and have kids. Rich or poor or stuck in the middle. When people hit their 30s they would start having kids. Now the problem here is there’s very little incentive to have a second one so the birth rate is very low.

Save for retirement…I find it pretty funny that you’re ranting about retirement plans when almost half of the Americans have less than 10k saved when they retired. This is now. I wonder how it’s gonna look when the millennials get to retirement age. On the contrary, according to a survey, Taiwanese ppl on average save 1/4 of income, which is highest in the region.

And many ppl buy cars. They are not elites.

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“Unable to buy a house? In Taipei yes. Some (late 30s) end up buying in other places like Taoyuan or Taichung.”

Yes with their parents money and a paying 60%+ of their salary on Mortgage even in Taoyuan or Taichung.

"They aren’t elites. I am sick of those who are dumb enough to believe that it’s easy to buy a house anywhere, except in America. Just open your eyes. No one in their 20s or 30s are buying an apartment in other countries. The price-income ratio is equally bad in most big cities and worse in many. "

I didnt say Taiwan was the only country with super inflated real estate to income.
This has become a problem the past 25 years around the world."

The US is not the only country where income to house makes historic sense.
In Japan just as 1 example only. The income to house price is very reasonable and people in their 30s are buying houses even 15 mins from the Center of Tokyo by train for a Single Family detached Brand new 3bed 2bath house starting at roughly 250-300k USD https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iGbC5j4pG9w

“Plenty of ppl get married and have kids. Rich or poor or stuck in the middle. When people hit their 30s they would start having kids. Now the problem here is there’s very little incentive to have a second one so the birth rate is very low.”

Pure BS, do you live in Taiwan? Its a big thing here now. Countless local news articles talking about this every other week. Also I have a lot of young 20s and 30s on my team and they and their friends/classmates all say its an issue for their generation regardless of what some detached government stat says, it does not reflect reality.

"Save for retirement…I find it pretty funny that you’re ranting about retirement plans when almost half of the Americans have less than 10k saved when they retired. This is now. I wonder how it’s gonna look when the millennials get to retirement age. On the contrary, according to a survey, Taiwanese ppl on average save 1/4 of income, which is highest in the region. "

This Post is about Taiwan not about retirement in the US, so thats what I was responding about. Not sure why retirement in the US or anywhere else matters but you brought it up and seem obviously triggered by it.

1/4 of what? 30k, 40k? or the 10% of the Population that earns over 61k? Lol. All the stats show that yes Taiwanese used to save a lot, especially the boomers when their salaries had a stronger purchasing power.

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Taiwanese families have saved a lot., The younger generation not so much , generally only possible if their parents already have housing that they gift them or they can live in their parents house.

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Yes I definitely agree Boomer Gen and Older Gen X saved a lot in TW. They bought while salaries were reasonable and interest rates were high when compared to its purchasing power against property, food, and general cost of living. Hell who wouldn’t have saved when interest rates fetched 10-15% in the 80’s

TW Millenials not saving so much. Many reports about this on News like every day, in fact just had a conversation yesterday with one of my employees in his 30s about how hes the only one able to save among his friends and classmates. They’ve stopped caring and just buy what they want because its hopeless for the majority of them.
They live at home and splurge and buy a nike shoe or an iPhone.

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I was under the impression that real interest rates in Taiwan were negative in the 70s and 80s, was this not the case ?

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It was about 15% in 1980

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Yes, that would be nominal interest rate. I was asking about the real interest rate.

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With an inflation rate to match

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Wow if youre really interested theres this thing.

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The notion that Japan’s housing is affordable is a myth. He said one can buy a house with 300,000 USD, roughly 33 million JPY, in Tokyo? Well take a look at their housing website. That money can get you a 15 ping old apartment close to the outskirt of Tokyo 23.

Conclusion: he’s lying.

You are full of shit. You said people aren’t getting married and having kids when there are still hundreds of thousands of couples getting married and having kids each year.

So no one is able to save for retirement everywhere then?

If you want to believe in these often contradictory salary reports, be my guest. The truth is even with lower income, people still save a little more than most other places.

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This study seems to be flawed, they dont include cost of housing in their inflation calculations. But, I will look at it later in more detail.

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I also had someone tell me this. I asked him what his point of reference was and he said San Francisco :rofl:

Rent in Tokyo is relatively reasonable though.

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Would be more interesting to see housing costs vs income in cities other than Tokyo. I reckon they will be quite reasonable in Japan. They aren’t getting paid peanuts like workers in Taiwan in the hinterland.

Taiwan’s average wages are skewed by the govt workers and the big earners.
Most workers in Taiwan just get half a months bonus . That’s what happened. Companies used to give good bonuses every year but the bosses became meaner and meaner using the concept of 經濟不景氣
(economy not good) even though most years their profits have been quite good.

So GDP GNP grew steadily except for a couple of blips but workers share of the profits didnt (not helped by mass importation of labourers from third world).

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Hokkaido allows Mainland Chinese buyers to buy farmland, with the expected results.

http://www.atimes.com/article/hokkaido-lands-gobbled-chinese-money/