TSMC is doing great things no doubt. But that’s one part of the stack. And Intel just appointed a proper CEO so don’t count them out as yet.
But overall, negating the threat from China. I wouldn’t say Taiwan will enter a golden age. Just based on my short stay here. However, as a stock, it’s something I would buy long i.e positive 10 year outlook.
I feel the comparison with HK is poor, yes you can argue both in the past they were in a similar position with healthy electronics industries. But for historical and political reasons they never got that economy upscaling and were left behind by Taiwan/South Korea/Singapore.
They’ve never had anything close to TSMC supporting the economy. And never had a solid gov push to grow or expand the sector. This is in part due to HK being a minor city colony of the UK soon to be transferred, and the Chinese never saw reason to invest in HK’s electronic sector either when they can move everything to Shenzhen.
South Korea/Taiwan had substantial gov investment into R&D led industrial upgrading in their electronics industries, and especially chip foundries. They’ve struck gold that HK never did and with the billions being pumped into further investment and foundries it’s doubtful anything will change in the near future.
Taxes are low compared to everywhere in the region except Singapore and HK.
The bureaucratic red tape is a problem, but more for SMEs. Companies like Google have armies of lawyers.
That’s my point of course. Taiwan increasingly relies on zero-sum industries. Outside of semiconductors and plastics, Taiwan doesn’t produce much. It’s not investing socially. But moe, it’s about attitude. People are obsessed with making money but have no commitment to nation-building, just like HK in the 90s. Why would the Chinese government pay me to say that? What a silly thing to say.
That’s not really true. It’s just the relative size of the other industries are much smaller. I mean Taiwan does make a lot of stuff in other industries such as scooters, vehicle parts, metal parts, mechanical stuff, bikes, biosensors just off the top of my head. Just not so much growth or so dominant.
It’s the fact that so much of this construction is unnecessary that is ugly. have you been to a rural township recently? Practically everything constructed now is poorly designed outside of roads and tunnels. Taiwan is good at roads and tunnels 
Producing manufactured goods is not the be all and end all of economies. Services are also a production.
What is being constructed right now that is ugly?
What ugly construction is happening right now?
Show me examples.
Is this ugly?
Where is the ugly construction happening now?
That is so true. There’s this innate conservatism, typical of the insecure, that says save for a rainy day, or a war. But still you see so much self-defeating stinginess. Yet a laoban will save hard to buy the latest BMW. And drive it where? Down a grubby, cramped road. Go figure.
I’m considering moving to yilan now. Better air, close to nature, cheaper than taipei and away from busy Taipei. But im researching rentals and holy moly has rental costs gone up. My old place in Kaohsiung.was 3 bedrooms and over 20 ping for $8k, now you get a closet space for that price. And the rental stock looks downright horrific… old dated places, bathroom original from 30 years ago, poorly lit, amenities as old as the apartment
If you look at it closely, outside and within, you will notice it is very badly designed. A lot of space is wasted, and ground “killed.” No thought whatsoever. To me, it’s ugly. But actually that’s not a bad effort compared to the monstrosities you find in rural townships.
I looked at yilan recently aswell. There’s a lack of new housing there. I also looked at individual housing. Toucheng had a few options .
I think the building is fairly inoffensive.
But it doesn’t really suggest that all construction is ugly. Not everything can be a Frank Gehry
Bottom line: you will have to commute or live both in Yilan and Taipei. It’s not as simple as you think. Some do commute daily. Not a lot of fun.
A lot of people don’t need to commute often these days. So it’s more feasible than before.
Toucheng looks nice. And closer to Taipei too. You say it has more options or not many options?
I think it had a few new places . It’s handy for commuting too.
Yilan city is a lot bigger obviously.
Seriously. Do your homework.
The jobs coming in are increasingly more value added.
All the American tech giants are doing most of their regional AI research in the area here. It’s going in the other direction.
The only objective way to is to use the indicators development agencies like the World Bank uses.
Otherwise it’s all personal preferences. You’d be like Ralph Jennings, i.e., Taiwan is less developed because it doesn’t have enough green shrubbery.
I don’t believe Taiwan property market bubble will burst like japanese did. I see steady increase of prices witin range of 2x to 5x in next 20 years (in USD value).
ROC central bank has strong position and financial system is super stable. Culture is diff
As someone has pointed out potencial conflict with China, there is another way too. Millions of Chinese emigrants and billions of cash. To me both events have equal odds.
Both are a nightmare. The second one will not happen unless Taiwan is destroyed first.
If you want that to happen you are no friend of mine.