Taipei Times
Date: Jun 12, 2017
By: Chen Wei-han / Staff reporter

Taiwan Solidarity Union (TSU) members and former military conscripts
yesterday urged the government to amend its reform plans to include a “conscript pension,” saying it is unfair that only former conscripts who work in the public sector can count their years in the military toward their pension entitlements.

The same seniority calculation criterion is not applicable to conscripts who later pursue a career in the private sector, and their military service does not qualify them for pension eligibility, making the nation’s pension system biased toward public-sector workers, TSU Deputy Secretary-General Wang Ming-yuan (王銘源) said.

The bias stems from Constitutional Interpretation No. 455, which defines military personnel as civil servants and stipulates that the service of conscripts who later work as public-sector employees contributes toward their retirement benefits, Wang said.

The constitutional ruling favors private-sector workers over public-sector employees, which should be considered a violation of the constitutional right to equality, he said.    [FULL  STORY]