Many of the TW businesses i am in touch with HOPE that TW will benefit from the trade war, but in reality, i havent encountered many examples of TW companies repatriating their manufacturing to TW. Most of the ppl i talk to mention moving manufacturing to Vietnam and not back to TW.
Do you think the TW economy actually benefited from the US-China trade tensions? Or just the laobans continue to make money but for the regular people nothing will change.
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The companies I talked to recently (computer mainboards) would like to relocate some manufacturing to Taiwan. But they claimed they were limited by the availability of manufacturing workers in Taiwan. Thus, some go south east Asia like Vietnam.
I’d love to see mainboard manufacturing coming back home to Taiwan. It’s so much more convenient and efficient if the development and the manufacturing are close to each other, or at least not in different countries.
I haven’t encountered directly but I’ve certainly read that investment is up. It may be that many are just enlarging or expanding on their present footprint in Taiwan. That itself would have a strong impact.
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Taiwan is certainly getting some. But other countries seem to be getting more.
I wonder if it is solely trade war or a mix of Chinas stricter environmental rules and their unstable/corrupt system maming it harder for companies there. Have seen a lot of companies in recent years plan the move out due to this. Doesnt mean they all come here though. Seems taiwn still has some work to do in attracting foriegn money and talent. But they are still succeeding.
It was happening anyway as costs were going up and they are getting stricter about environmental protection, which Taiwanese companies were complaining about !
The trade war just accelerated the process.
Taiwan isn’t attracting huge foreign investment, it seems to be 90% plus taishang. Id invest in Taiwan facilities if I was a regional manager rather than places like Singapore where staff cost a fortune and they move to another competitor within a tear or two . It’s the high income tax and the financial system that puts a lot of people off Taiwan.
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Is tax here high? Personal income tax is a bit high sure. But companies normally end up paying about 2% on gross and corporate tax is going to be 20% on net via the audit system. Seems low/decent.
In my opinion the manufacturing jobs are not going to happen here due to labor. The cost vs outcome here is very bad (more costs for employer to hire while workers are not motivated and not productive). Coupled with a relatively low prospect of people wanting to immigrate here or cpme work. Improving the openess to foreign cultures coming and staying, and the tallent pool and work performance will exceed. Then other things can be discussed.
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It’s very high compared to Singapore and Hong Kong.
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Having worked in Taiwan IT companies my opinion is that only a small portion of specialized, smaller production amount products (with higher prices) can make their way back to Taiwan. Some move back due to requests of US government to have more secure software loading and secure facilities for communication product production (scared of China infiltration).
Other products are limited by higher wages, lack of workers and supply chain issues.
Any company moving back here also has to coordinate with hundreds of suppliers to try to ensure JIT delivery of components. Certainly easier in China if suppliers are located within a few hours transportation time.
A friend was the HR head in a local IT company. Previously the boss required their small factory in Tainan to only use Taiwan workers. Usually the factory had a 20% headcount turnover per week… on monthly basis always very high. The work was less strenuous than I have seen at plants in China.
IT assembly plants in China are huge…20,000 to 50,000 workers Imagine trying to supply workers for just one factory. Even doing this in China is difficult. Automation has not kept up with the cost down trend.
Twenty years of quarterly cost down requests to Taiwan suppliers from branded companies has reached the point where almost no way to produce except in lower cost countries.
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Pretty much. And the local workforce issue is now a very cultural type thing now. People are rather lazy now and come and go as they please. Little work is done too mich of the time. It cant work here.
Unless taiwan starts to reflect on their (individual) ethics and efforts, only foreign workers could possible solve this issue.
The market could too, but seems people (even the human rights facebook warriors) would rather save 10% on any purchase and support China knowing full the karma that will ensue.
Seems Taiwan is slowly letting itself drown. Very hard to watch.
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Ya, many places are high compared to hk and singapore. They are cities that barely make anything. Mostly office and logistics. Thats why they became hubs. But taiwan isnt on their level anymore. We are far more manufacturing focused compared to them. On a world stage personal income taxes seem relatively normal. Bur i come from canada so my opinion of high is admittedly different.
Though im sure if taiwan was just taipei county it would also have become an international mo ey laundering hub/business headquarters.
Taiwan is doing pretty well overall in terms of its economy and prosperity. It’s no surprise most people don’t want to do repetitive jobs if they have a choice. That’s not laziness that’s just having a choice.
Personal incomes taxes rates are higher here once you start earning 70k-100k a year, I believe they may be higher than the United states even . Taiwanese pay little income tax because they get many rebates by including relatives in the claim but foreigners cannot easily do this. There are eight people on my tax claim. All legal and all above board. I couldn’t easily do that when I had no in laws and kids and spouse here. The tax situation has improved quite a bit though under Tsai I am not complaining. Tsai has exempted min wage workers from paying tax.
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Taiwanese factories have a window to capture new business. They have to move faster. I’m trying to have more products made here but Taiwanese are painfully slow to engage even though they have to talent. I need for them to make suggestions based on their experience and quit waiting for everything to be perfect. This is why they will lose this game. I’m in a injection molding negotiation that is incredibly painfully for me. My client has their design but they don’t know injection molding, and I need the factory to tell us the best way to inject to balance cost and aesthetics.
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Choice isnt laziness per se. But many (talking about the new workforce) have not drive ornloyalty and dont try to improve. Its a chicken or the egg thing for sure as many bosses are crap too. But the innovation and hard work ethics are all but gone in taiwan. Living off of old money essentially.
Taxes go up but isnt 35% the cap? I forgot.
Smart taiwanese open up a company and run all expenses through that and pay almost nothing.
Aikaili. Yup. Very frustrating. Its a common thing in taiwan for the factories and companies here litteraly just dont want to do business with people. Frustrating to the point customers and clients often go elsewhere. Feel your pain 
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You can’t do that if you are working for a multinational or a foreign worker and that’s my point. You don’t need to open a company as long as you aren’t making massive money, you can still whack your taxes down claiming other deductions if you are a local.
Foreigners can certainly open companies here. Many do it. A few restrictions and hoops but Tsai made that process far less painful.
However i am talking about taiwanese not foreigners. And the lack lustre workforce here is driving down the country which is why they really should be bringing in more foreign tallent and giving them reasonable options to stay (such as possibility of citizenship amongst other incentives). With that, we might be able to turn around the plummet of the work efficiency situation here which is affecting really a lot of trade country wide.
Seems only the tech industry actually has its shit right with other individual compaies in othersectors doing well. Rarely we all thing to ourselves an entire industry is a well oild.machine leading the world in its innovation amd standards. Complacency and finger pointing to other countries, like china, is not going to solve much.
On personal taxes, can foreigners (arc/aprc) use their children on their taxes. Im not so familiar with this as my child is with a local so it is probably different.
The workforce issues are real enough, but one massive problem is the cost of real estate. Land in Taiwan is outrageously expensive, so the cost of building any sort of manufacturing enterprise - with its modest profit margins - is just a nonstarter. A 5000m2 factory + office complex, which might cost less than 2M euros in Europe, will cost 10M+ euros here just for the land. The only people I know of who are still doing that sort of thing are those who acquired land 50 years ago and held onto it.
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I know. My point is multinationals and those coming here on hire aren’t generally going to agree with that and want to do that . They need a work permit and to be above aboard, not messing around opening companies.
What’s a mainboard? I’d that like a motherboard?
Right and there is probably a factory in Shenzhen who will bend over themselves to be flexible
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not sure people are lazy, they work hard and fast compared to southern Europe and some parts of western Europe too.
I think staff turnover is mostly because of low pay, lack of motivation and crap attitude from the local laobans (the first time I met with one local boss, many years ago, i thought he is treating his employees like serfs ).
when you know you won’t go far beyond 50k nt a month, there is little motivation to excel.
the local staff in the foreign companies seems to be more motivated imo
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