More than half of office workers were pessimistic about the local investment climate despite the recovering economy, a poll showed yesterday.
Asked if they were optimistic about the short-term investment climate, 59 percent of white-collar workers surveyed by the Taipei-based 1111 Job Bank responded negatively.
Similarly, 52 percent of respondents said their willingness to invest in the near term had not improved.
Given that the economy has posted its second consecutive -double-digit quarterly growth this year — 13.71 percent in the first quarter and 12.53 percent in the second quarter ending June 30 — Henry Ho (何啟聖), 1111 Job Bank’s public relations director, said the pessimism resulted from a lack of wage increases.
“Although it is generally believed that the business climate has improved a lot, many local wage earners have not enjoyed a pay raise and are not that optimistic as a result,” he told reporters.
Ho said that 39 percent of office workers polled said they had not received a pay raise in at least three years. Of the 47 percent who had seen their wages grow over that period, three-fifths had received pay raises of less than 5 percent, he added.
The poll also showed that 31 percent of people surveyed said their annual wages had not yet returned to same level as before the 2008 global financial crisis hit, with another 44 percent saying they now earn as much as they did in 2008.
However, when other sources of income were included, 56 percent of respondents said their annual income had yet to return to pre-crisis levels. Twenty-nine percent of workers polled admitted to additional sources of income.
The poll indicated that 89 percent of respondents were dissatisfied with their current income.
Regarding the lack of wage increases, Peter Wu (吳良治), director of human resources at realtor Evertrust Rehouse Group (永慶房屋), told reporters that the recent increase in company profits did not necessarily lead to pay raises for employees because companies also had to take costs into consideration.
Using his own company as an example, Wu said that Evertrust instead focused on the welfare of its employees by investing more in training, company tours and annual bonuses.
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