Germany has/had a lot of problems with the “guest workers” it invited in from Turkey. They have residence but no citizenship FAIK. This creates a lot of problems for them. A lot of them have no real ties to Turkey anymore.
Taiwan needed/needs these foreign workers because Taiwanese do not want to do those jobs. The harsh and tough and dangerous construction jobs or the maid work for the money offered. Can the TW society/economy support paying TW wages (acceptable to TW workers) or continue to “import” workers who WILL do them?
South Africa before 1990:
i see many negative images on blacks here. I say most are well treated. some lucky ones are even treated like family members. they go to restaurants for dinners with white families! you can go to parks in Johannesburg in the afternoon; you will see many blacks wheeling old people and they talk and laugh. before my grandmom died we used to hire black workers to work in the garden and clean the house. they were definitely treated like family members. we gave them gifts at Christmas and on New Years! unfortunately one of them stole things from us, but we just called the cops to take him/her back to the homelands; didn’t even give him/her any bad look.
Just sayin’ is all… [/quote]
I’ve been thinking about this for 2 days. You maybe made a different point of view I didn’t think about before, but there are still differences inbetween your analogs. 1st of all, there is no apartheid in Taiwan. 2nd, I was talking about factual matters. [color=#FF0000]Personally, I disagree to letting SE Asian laborers work here. It will make Taiwan stay put without the intention to advance to a higher ground. [/color]
That’s going to far. Most Taiwanese are decent people, like anyone anywhere. But it would be ignorant to ignore the plight of many foreign workers in Taiwan. It is quite common that Thai/Filipino/Indonesian etc workers are locked in dormitories at night. Most, if not all, are only allowed free time on a Sunday to go to church and meet with friends. And they have a curfew. Even on their day off. At best, they’re treated like children.[/quote]
It’s true there is currently existing inhuman treatment to those foreign laborers. But… Sorry I’ll take a bad example for this one: at lease we don’t see any foreign laborer jump off the floor for suicide like in China what happened to FoxConn. And my own witnessing on one of the domitories was that I heard alot of girly screaming, talking and laughing in there once I passed by a dorm in Hsinchu… Why did I know it’s a dorm for foreign laborers? Cuz [color=#FF0000]I asked a SE Asian girl out from there![/color]
Anyway [color=#FF0000]I truly hope there will be no more or much less foreign laborers/maids working in Taiwan in the future[/color]. This [color=#FF0000]we should learn from Japan[/color], who has a very tight policy on move-in laborers.
So, on the other ‘land’, [color=#FF0000]if you are Thai/Filipino/Indonesian people[/color] who happened to see this thread, [color=#FF0000]go back to your countiries[/color], call for drastic politician reforms to pull down those interests-vested politicians who never really want the people to get good lives.[/quote] I’m speechless…
[quote=“tommy525”]Germany has/had a lot of problems with the “guest workers” it invited in from Turkey. They have residence but no citizenship FAIK. This creates a lot of problems for them. A lot of them have no real ties to Turkey anymore.
Taiwan needed/needs these foreign workers because Taiwanese do not want to do those jobs. The harsh and tough and dangerous construction jobs or the maid work for the money offered. Can the TW society/economy support paying TW wages (acceptable to TW workers) or continue to “import” workers who WILL do them?[/quote]
It’s a natural process. As more and more locals become educated, less and less people are willing to do manual labour. These kinds of labourers are always going to be necessary. In Taiwan. In Japan. Everywhere. Taiwan will continue importing foreign labourers, unless the economy gets shot to hell and the only work that the average person in Taiwan can get to feed his family is menial labour.
So unless people like Golf are willing to work clean toilets, build roads, work construction and take care of old people for shitty wages and no freedom, the foreign workers are here to stay. There is no question about that. The question is, are we going to continue to allow many of them to be treated no better than slaves, or are we going to grow a conscience and move forward? Progress socially?
My guess is that change is inevitable. Ironically, with the low birth rate and less and less Taiwanese women wishing to marry and have kids, more and more men are marrying foreign brides. We no longer have laws were kids like you (foreign father/Taiwanese mother) are denied citizenship. Mixed kids being born are quickly catching up to the number of Taiwanese-Taiwanese kids being born. It’s no longer a small percentage, but the norm in the classroom.
Taiwan is not the same country it was 20 years ago, and it will be significantly different in another 20.
South Africa before 1990:
i see many negative images on blacks here. I say most are well treated. some lucky ones are even treated like family members. they go to restaurants for dinners with white families! you can go to parks in Johannesburg in the afternoon; you will see many blacks wheeling old people and they talk and laugh. before my grandmom died we used to hire black workers to work in the garden and clean the house. they were definitely treated like family members. we gave them gifts at Christmas and on New Years! unfortunately one of them stole things from us, but we just called the cops to take him/her back to the homelands; didn’t even give him/her any bad look.
Just sayin’ is all… [/quote]
I’ve been thinking about this for 2 days. You maybe made a different point of view I didn’t think about before, but there are still differences inbetween your analogs. 1st of all, there is no apartheid in Taiwan. 2nd, I was talking about factual matters. Personally, I disagree to letting SE Asian laborers work here. It will make Taiwan stay put without the intention to advance to a higher ground.
That’s going to far. Most Taiwanese are decent people, like anyone anywhere. But it would be ignorant to ignore the plight of many foreign workers in Taiwan. It is quite common that Thai/Filipino/Indonesian etc workers are locked in dormitories at night. Most, if not all, are only allowed free time on a Sunday to go to church and meet with friends. And they have a curfew. Even on their day off. At best, they’re treated like children.[/quote]
It’s true there is currently existing inhuman treatment to those foreign laborers. But… Sorry I’ll take a bad example for this one: at lease we don’t see any foreign laborer jump off the floor for suicide like in China what happened to FoxConn. And my own witnessing on one of the domitories was that I heard alot of girly screaming, talking and laughing in there once I passed by a dorm in Hsinchu… Why did I know it’s a dorm for foreign laborers? Cuz I asked a SE Asian girl out from there!
Anyway I truly hope there will be no more or much less foreign laborers/maids working in Taiwan in the future. This we should learn from Japan, who has a very tight policy on move-in laborers.
So, on the other ‘land’, if you are Thai/Filipino/Indonesian people who happened to see this thread, go back ot your countiries, call for drastic politician reforms to pull down those interests-vested politicians who never really want the people to get good lives.[/quote]
Golf:
When South East Asian workers can’t take it anymore, they run away, they do not jump off rooftops. They need to keep working as 1. they have thousands of dollars in debt from the slave-traders, sorry agents, that bring them here 2. they have family that depends on their earnings for survival
ps. There are thousands of runaway workers, chcke the stats, that is why “owners” lock the dorms…
Most Taiwanese are decent people, but as the Latin phrase goes “good people think no evil of others”, they are quite oblivious to many injustices around them, or worse, take a condescending attitude that does not help anyone, especially themselves.
That is as much as I can say now without stepping the line. I join the speechless. Please reread your statement and you’ll see why. sigh
If I get paid TWD500/hr for cleaning streets/toilets I’d love to do it! Note that Taiwan Confederation Of Trade Unions (the general labor union of Taiwan) stood against foreign laborer’s policy ALL THE TIMES!
What will progress is the technology of cleaning equipment, sterilization techniques, tunneling machines, automatic welding intruments, road paving vehicles, hygiene devices… if there is lack of cleaning and road construction workers. Ok not available for now - let those poor people do the cleaning. Bunch of Taiwanese people are underpaid or without jobs, because they have to compete with the foreign laborers! What impressed me when I lived in those Austrian hotels is that there is a big hotel with many rooms, but always seen with very few cleaning staff!
Under the ideal situation (that this Golf always have), foreign wokers who possess professional knowledge on such as cleaning equipment, sterilization techniques, tunneling machines, automatic welding intruments, road paving vehicles, hygiene devices… of course including languages, are most welcome!
Nobody’s going to pay you 500NT an hour for cleaning streets. You must either be from Taida, a politician’s kid or insanely rich to think that kind of money is paid in the real job for manual labour, unless there’s some very complex engineering skills required.
I used to work in one of those ‘big hotels’ in London. Absolutely spotless. We had an ARMY of cleaning staff, and they were all foreign workers (mostly from Eastern EU countries). You don’t see them because the cleaning of the 4-star was arranged for a time when most guests would be out, and the 5* was done per suite as the concierge saw the guests leave.
I’ve always though that being a chambermaid in a hotel would be a good job for a youngster, but unfortunately have been pushed out of the market by foreign workers (since they were all hired through an agency which I think dealt solely with foreign workers). To be honest though, this made me search for better opportunities and I ended up working jobs that enhanced my resume, rather than just filled a spot on it.
You should move to Australia. Professional Skilled Migration is a great thing. Unfortunately it’s very unlikely to happen in a country where the only ‘professionals’ society is not prejudiced against are those from Western countries and Japan, Korea etc. … and these people generally will not leave behind a very high salary in their home country for a normal TW salary. This makes the hiring of skilled professionals very difficult.
First and foremost, however, people are people where-ever you go. Whatever your feelings about the role of foreign labourers in this country, you surely can’t agree that their employer has the right to treat them however they like?
[/quote]
I’m speechless…
[/quote]
Perhaps because you’re not entirely sure why we’re speechless?