COMMOTION CODIFIED?Chinese Culture University professor Lee Chien-hung said that the Labor Standards Act always brings about endless controversy and haggling

Taipei Times
Date: Jul 13, 2017
By: Abraham Gerber / Staff reporter

Labor rights advocates yesterday renewed calls for President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) to fulfil campaign promises to pass a minimum-wage act and criticized review standards as a meeting of the Ministry of Labor’s annual Minimum Wage Review Committee approaches.

“The government cannot keep avoiding this issue, as it was one of its main labor policy promises and is crucial to Tsai’s vow to combat low wages,” Taiwan Labor Front secretary-general Son Yu-liam (孫友聯) said, adding that while the New Power Party (NPP) and the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) legislative caucuses have proposed minimum-wage legislation, the Democratic Progressive Party’s (DPP) legislative caucus has yet to take action.

“What is meant by ‘basic’ has never been clearly defined,” Son said, adding that the government has often changed its calculation standards, at one point seeking to make determinations based on a formula centered around industrial production and economic growth.

The minimum wage was most recently raised to NT$21,009 per month following last year’s meeting, with this year’s to be held by the end of September, according to the provisions of the Regulations for the Deliberation of Basic Wage (基本工資審議辦法).
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