The average starting wage for first-time jobseekers in Taiwan hit a new high since the global financial crisis rocked the economy in 2008, according to a poll released by online job bank yes123.
Citing the survey, yes123 said that the average starting wage employers were willing to offer to new university graduates this year reached NT$26,338 (US$810.25), up by about 3.4 percent from the NT$25,461 recorded in a similar survey conducted last year.
Yes123 said that employers were even willing to give starting average wages of NT$27,518 for new graduates from some prestigious institutions, such as National Taiwan University, National Chengchi University, National Tsing Hua University and National Chiao Tung University.
However, the job bank said that the average starting wage for graduates of these select schools was only NT$376 more than the average offered a year earlier.
The survey showed that 93.9 percent of the 820 polled enterprises said they were planning to hire new graduates, slightly greater than the 93.1 percent recorded in a poll conducted last year.
This year’s figure also marked a new high since 2008.
Among the enterprises that were willing to recruit new graduates, first-time jobseekers are expected to account for an average of 23.9 percent of their total recruitment this year.
The yes123 survey was conducted from May 16 to May 19, with most of the polled employers having a paid-in capital of less than NT$100 million. The survey had a confidence level of 95 percent and a margin of error of plus or minus 3.42 percentage points.
EXPECTATIONS GAP
Meanwhile, another poll indicated that new graduates wanted a higher salary than what was offered by employers, with the difference hitting a new seven-year high.
Online human resources advisory firm 1111 Job Bank (1111人力銀行), citing its own survey, said that the starting wages asked by first-time jobseekers averaged NT$32,609, but employers planned to offer only an average of NT$27,254.
According to its survey, the difference stood at NT$5,355 on average, the highest gap since 2010.
JOB PREFERENCE
The job bank said that 82 percent of the polled first-time jobseekers would like to jump into the job market soon after they leave school, while 21 percent of them had already landed a job before graduation.
The survey showed that the information technology sector was the most popular field for first-time jobseekers, unchanged from a year earlier.
In terms of job categories, 48.9 percent of the jobseekers said that they wanted to work for administrative or human resources departments, followed by trading, customer service and marketing.
Stephen Garrett, a 27-year-old graduate student, always thought he would study in China, but first the country’s restrictive COVID-19 policies made it nearly impossible and now he has other concerns. The cost is one deterrent, but Garrett is more worried about restrictions on academic freedom and the personal risk of being stranded in China. He is not alone. Only about 700 American students are studying at Chinese universities, down from a peak of nearly 25,000 a decade ago, while there are nearly 300,000 Chinese students at US schools. Some young Americans are discouraged from investing their time in China by what they see
MAJOR DROP: CEO Tim Cook, who is visiting Hanoi, pledged the firm was committed to Vietnam after its smartphone shipments declined 9.6% annually in the first quarter Apple Inc yesterday said it would increase spending on suppliers in Vietnam, a key production hub, as CEO Tim Cook arrived in the country for a two-day visit. The iPhone maker announced the news in a statement on its Web site, but gave no details of how much it would spend or where the money would go. Cook is expected to meet programmers, content creators and students during his visit, online newspaper VnExpress reported. The visit comes as US President Joe Biden’s administration seeks to ramp up Vietnam’s role in the global tech supply chain to reduce the US’ dependence on China. Images on
New apartments in Taiwan’s major cities are getting smaller, while old apartments are increasingly occupied by older people, many of whom live alone, government data showed. The phenomenon has to do with sharpening unaffordable property prices and an aging population, property brokers said. Apartments with one bedroom that are two years old or older have gained a noticeable presence in the nation’s six special municipalities as well as Hsinchu county and city in the past five years, Evertrust Rehouse Co (永慶房產集團) found, citing data from the government’s real-price transaction platform. In Taipei, apartments with one bedroom accounted for 19 percent of deals last
US CONSCULTANT: The US Department of Commerce’s Ursula Burns is a rarely seen US government consultant to be put forward to sit on the board, nominated as an independent director Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), the world’s largest contract chipmaker, yesterday nominated 10 candidates for its new board of directors, including Ursula Burns from the US Department of Commerce. It is rare that TSMC has nominated a US government consultant to sit on its board. Burns was nominated as one of seven independent directors. She is vice chair of the department’s Advisory Council on Supply Chain Competitiveness. Burns is to stand for election at TSMC’s annual shareholders’ meeting on June 4 along with the rest of the candidates. TSMC chairman Mark Liu (劉德音) was not on the list after in December last