Two representatives from the private sector who quit the government’s Tax Reform Committee in 2008 have been included in a new 16-member task force on taxation and finance, the Ministry of Finance said yesterday.
Chien Hsi-chieh (簡錫堦) of the Anti-Poverty Alliance and Wang Jung-chang (王榮璋) of the Alliance for Fair Tax Reform were members of the third Tax Reform Committee that operated from June 2008 to December 2009, but they quit in protest against the committee’s pro-business policies.
This time, they are joining the task force to focus on the wealth gap and fair taxation issues.
The ministry will present a full list of the task force’s members to the legislature’s Finance Committee on Thursday next week. The group will hold its first meeting in the last week of this month, the ministry said in a statement.
The other 14 members of the task force include six government officials and eight academics.
Minister of Finance Christina Liu (劉憶如) will be the convener of the task force. Other government officials include Minister of Economic Affairs Shih Yen-shiang (施顏祥), Minister of the Interior Lee Hong-yuan (李鴻源) and National Science Council Minister Cyrus Chu (朱敬一).
Ho Chih-chin (何志欽), who served in the administration of former president Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) as finance minister, will also join the task force.
Greek tourism student Katerina quit within a month of starting work at a five-star hotel in Halkidiki, one of the country’s top destinations, because she said conditions were so dire. Beyond the bad pay, the 22-year-old said that her working and living conditions were “miserable and unacceptable.” Millions holiday in Greece every year, but its vital tourism industry is finding it harder and harder to recruit Greeks to look after them. “I was asked to work in any department of the hotel where there was a need, from service to cleaning,” said Katerina, a tourism and marketing student, who would
i Gasoline and diesel prices at fuel stations are this week to rise NT$0.1 per liter, as tensions in the Middle East pushed crude oil prices higher last week, CPC Corp, Taiwan (台灣中油) and Formosa Petrochemical Corp (台塑石化) said yesterday. International crude oil prices last week rose for the third consecutive week due to an escalating conflict between Israel and Iran, as the market is concerned that the situation in the Middle East might affect crude oil supply, CPC and Formosa said in separate statements. Front-month Brent crude oil futures — the international oil benchmark — rose 3.75 percent to settle at US$77.01
RECORD LOW: Global firms’ increased inventories, tariff disputes not yet impacting Taiwan and new graduates not yet entering the market contributed to the decrease Taiwan’s unemployment rate last month dropped to 3.3 percent, the lowest for the month in 25 years, as strong exports and resilient domestic demand boosted hiring across various sectors, the Directorate-General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics (DGBAS) said yesterday. After seasonal adjustments, the jobless rate eased to 3.34 percent, the best performance in 24 years, suggesting a stable labor market, although a mild increase is expected with the graduation season from this month through August, the statistics agency said. “Potential shocks from tariff disputes between the US and China have yet to affect Taiwan’s job market,” Census Department Deputy Director Tan Wen-ling
As they zigzagged from one machine to another in the searing African sun, the workers were covered in black soot. However, the charcoal they were making is known as “green,” and backers hope it can save impoverished Chad from rampant deforestation. Chad, a vast, landlocked country of 19 million people perched at the crossroads of north and central Africa, is steadily turning to desert. It has lost more than 90 percent of its forest cover since the 1970s, hit by climate change and overexploitation of trees for household uses such as cooking, officials say. “Green charcoal” aims to protect what
RSS