[quote]CHEWYCORNS: Most start at least 35,000 or 40,000, and even higher if they had a real degree from Brown (provided it wasn’t from the Kho San Road campus 
). Then again, you have to show your real value. Some of the most educated people I’ve met haven’t necessarily been the most productive employees. In some cases, they’ve been too set in their ways.
My wife never worked for any of the titans, but she did work for a Taiwanese-run SME startup. She had no university degree and mainly did secretarial work. Started at 35,000 month, 9 month bonus, other holiday bonuses, 6 hour a day work schedule, and they gave her a Mount Blanc pen and a number of Hermes ties (she gave to me :bravo: ) when she quit. If you counted up these benefits, she made more than most foreigner teachers here with degrees and arrogant attitudes. Traditional Taiwanese companies demand hard work and value loyalty and humbleness. You ain’t going to get a stellar package until you show your drive. Furthermore, the consensus non-confrontational style of management is something Europe and North America can and should learn from.
Bullshit. I knew a lawyer who had two babies within 2 years. Company was completely supportive.
[quote=“mike_rophonechecker”]And no you aint getting no holiday
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Bullshit. In Taiwan, you won’t get any holidays the first year. However, the private sector holiday schemes are much more generous than Taiwan’s public sector schemes in terms of flexibility. After two years, you get 10 days holidays (equates to two weeks of holidays). You’re also allotted over 100 hours of time you can take off for errands. So basically, that’s three week of holidays. Sick days paid at half pay. Can take longer unpaid leave if you need it. Not bad at all. The private health care coverage offered by most big companies in Taiwan is really good. These are pretty good benefits from a North American perspective. Maybe not as generous as some of the continental European countries (e.g France and Germany), but is that what the private sector wants to use as its inspiration in terms of HR policies? If anything, continental countries have been looking at becoming more like Britain and the US in terms of their HR policies and social programs This is a good thing, because as anyone familiar with birth rates and demographics will attest to, the state surely can’t afford to pay these benefits in Europe with the aging population.
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I’ve worked for numerous Taiwanese companies over the years. I have to call your writing it for what it is, complete BS. According to some studies Taiwanese work the most hours of any industrial nation on earth. There is no overtime pay, workers routinely work saturdays and sundays in some industries for no extra pay.
http://goliath.ecnext.com/coms2/gi_0199-5018933/LONG-WORK-HOURS-AFFECT-TAIWAN.html
http://blog.yam.com/sabin/article/8526824
Almost all workers start in any company in Taiwan at around 20-25k/mth. With many years of experience your pay might rise to 30k-40k at most. The pay rate is now the worst for 28 years! For somebody with no degree you would be lucky to get 20,000k/mth rising to 25k/mth after 10 years of so. Even with a masters from a uni from overseas my wife knows many Taiwanese who cannot get a job, if they do get one the masters only equals to an additional few thousand NTD/mth. Your writing about the bonus above could only be from around 1998-2000. It’s complete fantasy. Your understanding of vacations is also wrong. Workers are only entitled to 7 days vacation after working one full year (perhaps not including probation period). After that the norm is to add one day per year worked. Among ‘wai shang’ foreign companies the norm is 10 days starting. The pay rate in ‘Wai Shang’ has also dropped substantially to local levels but local people still prefer due to added training and benefits. Many companies including ‘Wai Shang’ are focusing on hiring contract workers now to cut back on benefits.
The bonus system is a form of slavery. It effectively says we can pay you a little bit more money if we feel like it and if you work like a slave for years and years, and it’s all if, arbirtrary, depending on the whims of management. Sick days are often not paid, only some companies offer half pay. I don’t anything about so called ‘100 hours off for errands’. You can take unpaid leave but you probably won’t have a job if it’s more than a week or two. These benefits are crap, total crap. Check how the Japanese renumerate their workers and you would understand. The state can afford to pay benefits to the workers as the workers pay taxes to the state to support it as do the corporations, simple really. I’d rather let trust the government which can be voted for by me every four years then the stock market for my pension. I don’t know why you are brinigng Europe into this anyway. Besides Europe is a big place with a lot of diversity between countries, I don’t think you understand much about it at all.
Last point regarding married women and pregnancy. There is massive discrimination against married women in the workforce in Taiwan as now they can claim some time off paid, so employers simply refuse to hire married women in many cases now. Have a baby and in most cases kiss your job and at least your career goodbye. Is it a wonder that Taiwan has another sad record, the lowest birth rate in the entire world.
Mr. Wang’s big break was a 50 million USD (382 MILLION US DOLLARS IN TODAYS MONEY!) soft loan from USAID in 1954. I’m not saying he saying he wasn’t a good businessman but he was supported by the US government with a MASSIVE amount of money and a low tax, low wage, low regulatory environment. He focused on cost down and made his billions in that manner. His contributions to GDP and economy are large but the money mostly flows into his family’s and shareholders pockets and still does (Formosa is the most profitable company in Taiwan). I don’t really see what the hell he or his family have done for Taiwan. I don’t see any parks, cities, built by him. I know he built some advanced hospitals and they are good but they are all for profit. His companies have caused and continue to cause massive pollution to Taiwan. Having come back from a weekend in Kaoshiung last weekend I found out they had built these great bike paths, then found out the reason nobody was riding that day, the pollution in the air meant we could hardly see a km ahead of us and it wasn’t very comfotable breathing in the toxic soup (which I assume is mostly from the oilrefinery in Kaoshiung, although state owned I’m sure some of it is linked to Formosa industries and he is trying to build a refinery in YunLin). He is a minnow compared to the Bill Gates and Buffet’s of this world! The only reason his companies are so profitable is they are getting subsidised energy from the state, duopoly status for processing oil in Taiwan and they avoid carbon and pollution tax by locating in Taiwan, SE Asia and China.
Perhaps you should be asking for your money back as you are an American citizen I guess.
I inserted it in the quote because I read it originally but then noticed you removed it. You really shouldn’t post at 340am. 
I couldn’t really care as the salary (35,000) is still small to a foreigner. But it is quite good for a person without an education. And the bonus for 2007 rocked. Other years, it wasn’t so good. The company has distribution rights for a drug used to treat a certain blood disorder.
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