Several Questions:
(1) Is it possible for an American to obtain Taiwan citizenship? (2) What are the taxes like? (3) What is the Taiwanese general attitude towards business? (4) Do Taiwanese get angry at foreigners running businesses like Koreans do?
I know these are a lot of questions, I am just looking for a place to move myself and my business to for a change of scenery.
50% of the middle class are self-employed in an Taiwan enterprise… store, trade office, or light industrial factory… making Taiwan a more dynamic environment for business. Wages are not so cheap anymore but the average worker is probably more proficient than their China counterparts at $100 monthly. It is provided for that “foreign labor” can be imported, but I don’t know much about this.
Running a business is not like in Korea but the ROC bureaucracy is typically Chinese in character: Slow moving.
The general business environment is favorable and taxes are on a territorial basis. If it is made in Taiwan, it is taxed in Taiwan.
Corporate rates, however, are not so similiar to Hong Kong’s business friendly rates like 16%. So, there are disadvantages of Taiwan, too. Some will like Sinapore instead but then Southeast Asia is not so industrious by nature. So Taiwan has some advantages like being more “foreigner friendly”.
Hong Kong only requires a $50,000 investment for a residency visa leading to “Permanent Abode” status after 7 years. And Shenzhen has similar investment requirements but no “permanent residency” options like in Taiwan. Taiwan law still does allow for the “treaty-investor” which confers the “Alien Resident Card”. After so many years, you are in legal theory eligible for ROC nationality. Talk to Richard Hartzell if you have similiar questions.
Taiwanstatus, where did you get your HK info? To my knowledge it is $6.5 million.
Check out this article:
http://cyberatlantis.com/index.php?id=674
quote:
Originally posted by taiwanstatus: Hong Kong only requires a $50,000 investment for a residency visa leading to "Permanent Abode" status after 7 years. And Shenzhen has similar investment requirements but no "permanent residency" options like in Taiwan. Taiwan law still does allow for the "treaty-investor" which confers the "Alien Resident Card".
I don’t think to run a business is that difficult in Taiwan, what kind of business you would like to do here ? I work for a giftware export company and we mainly sell to US or Europe.
I think to run a business is very interesting and challenge - but you need a strong heart to shoulder pressure…
I am in Electronics Manufacture.
So what sort of ‘pressure’ did you need to shoulder? (besides the normal small business related ones of course.) Thanks.
quote:
Originally posted by 4abudabit: Electronics ManufactureSo what sort of ‘pressure’ did you need to shoulder?
I’m not running my own business here, but my experiences from working in the electronics industry:
Staff
If you are only into manufacturing and not designing, people are relatively easy to find, but may be equally easily lost. Design people (R&D) is a different matter…
“Piracy”
Whatever you manufacture, if its selling reasonably, other companies will copy it. It may sound stupid, but it is totally normal here to scratch numbers off ICs or put the whole circuit into epoxy.
Both of the above together
If your staff sees you making money with your products they (at least a few) may leave and establish a similar business next door - with your supplier/customer database. It does not matter if they do not really understand the product, they will just offer lower prices and keep saying they “are professional and have experience”.
Suppliers
I don’t know in which arena you are going to play, but not every supplier may be very reliable.
All the above will not necessarily happen, but they MAY happen and should be considered in advance…
That has been the standard rule of thumb by Hong Kong attorneys from around 1997. It might have changed but the proposal in the article is in Hong Kong dollars or about USD 1 million. That is really overrating the value of Hong Kong and does not likely include any “treaty investor” exceptions, if still valid under SAR policy. I would suggest finding a Hong Kong SAR immigration attorney or consultant.
You can probably still go right into Shenzhen SEZ with a very similiar amount. Taiwan still has the “treaty investor” status for US citizens.
BTW, whom is your political risk insurance policy with? If AIG, then I would think twice about the financial security of their actuarial exposure to China. With $92 billion overvalued stocks on the NYSE, any negative results from these new RICO human rights lawsuits against Chinese SOEs in the USA could ultimately leave any US investments in China very exposed to some politically-motivated retaliations. AIG might not be able to cover all the resulting losses.
I would stick with OPIC which is also backed by the full faith of the US government for being an official government instrumentality. So Taiwan is still covered, but not China coverages.