The Directorate General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics (DGBAS) has announced an economic growth rate of 6.92 percent for the third quarter, up from 5.24 percent for the second quarter. This is 2.45 percentage points higher than the government's forecast of 4.47 percent in August and 1.76 percentage points higher than the average forecast of 5.16 percent made by 12 Dow Jones economists. The DGBAS has thus revised its forecast of 4.58 percent to 5.46 percent, an increase of 0.88 percentage points.
The gradual revitalization of the economy has made several politicians lose their bearings. Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) vice presidential candidate Vincent Siew (
Last week, Yeh Wan-an (
As national economic statistics follow a set of strict, internationally observed procedures, Wei and Yeh should understand that forecasts and outcomes are often inconsistent and that discrepancies can be large. It is not so much that the statistics are wrong but that the economic environment cannot be controlled.
For example, Singapore's economic growth forecast based on annualized third quarter growth was 6.4 percent, but the final figure was only 4.3 percent -- a discrepancy of 2.1 percent.
As a reflection of the uncertainty of the global economy, the Singaporean government has forecast that growth next year will fall between 4.5 percent and 6.5 percent. The difference of 2 percentage points is meant to accommodate a large discrepancy between the forecast and reality.
As for the US, the forecast annual growth rate based on annualized third quarter figures is 4.9 percent, 1 percentage point higher than the rough forecast of 3.9 percent a month earlier. This is the highest third quarter growth in the last four years. Contrary to expectations, the subprime mortgage crisis didn't have an impact on third quarter growth.
The real manipulators of distorted economic figures are politicians. The question of whether economic growth benefits all sectors of society is a matter of income distribution and whether deteriorating trade conditions will hurt proportional income growth.
Anyone contesting growth figures because of existing income distribution problems is unprofessional or lost in the attempt to manipulate political interests.
During President Chen Shui-bian's (
From a GDP perspective, Taiwan has returned to a potential level of approximately 5 percent growth after undergoing the 2001 economic recession when the global high-tech bubble burst.
It is impressive to see Taiwan's economy retaining such resilience and flexibility after suffering years of political conflict.
However, Taiwan's worsened trade conditions have indeed meant that real GDP, which is used to calculate economic growth, includes a high proportion of illusory income -- according to my estimate, approximately 4 percent in 2004, 6 percent in 2005 and 7 percent last year.
In part, this is a reflection of how domestic industry is climbing the technological ladder, but also that their efforts to develop high-end products have been insufficient.
This is something the government should draw up careful and effective policies to deal with.
Hwan C. Lin is a research fellow at the Taiwan Public Policy Council and associate professor of economics at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte.
Translated by Ted Yang
Donald Trump’s return to the White House has offered Taiwan a paradoxical mix of reassurance and risk. Trump’s visceral hostility toward China could reinforce deterrence in the Taiwan Strait. Yet his disdain for alliances and penchant for transactional bargaining threaten to erode what Taiwan needs most: a reliable US commitment. Taiwan’s security depends less on US power than on US reliability, but Trump is undermining the latter. Deterrence without credibility is a hollow shield. Trump’s China policy in his second term has oscillated wildly between confrontation and conciliation. One day, he threatens Beijing with “massive” tariffs and calls China America’s “greatest geopolitical
On Sunday, 13 new urgent care centers (UCC) officially began operations across the six special municipalities. The purpose of the centers — which are open from 8am to midnight on Sundays and national holidays — is to reduce congestion in hospital emergency rooms, especially during the nine-day Lunar New Year holiday next year. It remains to be seen how effective these centers would be. For one, it is difficult for people to judge for themselves whether their condition warrants visiting a major hospital or a UCC — long-term public education and health promotions are necessary. Second, many emergency departments acknowledge
US President Donald Trump’s seemingly throwaway “Taiwan is Taiwan” statement has been appearing in headlines all over the media. Although it appears to have been made in passing, the comment nevertheless reveals something about Trump’s views and his understanding of Taiwan’s situation. In line with the Taiwan Relations Act, the US and Taiwan enjoy unofficial, but close economic, cultural and national defense ties. They lack official diplomatic relations, but maintain a partnership based on shared democratic values and strategic alignment. Excluding China, Taiwan maintains a level of diplomatic relations, official or otherwise, with many nations worldwide. It can be said that
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairwoman Cheng Li-wun (鄭麗文) made the astonishing assertion during an interview with Germany’s Deutsche Welle, published on Friday last week, that Russian President Vladimir Putin is not a dictator. She also essentially absolved Putin of blame for initiating the war in Ukraine. Commentators have since listed the reasons that Cheng’s assertion was not only absurd, but bordered on dangerous. Her claim is certainly absurd to the extent that there is no need to discuss the substance of it: It would be far more useful to assess what drove her to make the point and stick so
RSS