The National Teachers’ Association said yesterday that it did not oppose levying income taxes on primary and secondary school teachers but that the government should offer compensation to relieve teachers of the additional financial burden.
Yeh Ching-rong (葉慶龍), an association convener who specializes in tax issues, said that reimposing the tax levy on teachers and military personnel would add to their already heavy financial burden as inflation soars.
The Ministry of Finance’s tax reform committee should therefore consider whether imposing taxes on the income of teachers and military personnel is appropriate, Yeh said.
He said the tax-exempt status for school teachers was an important incentive to attract people to the teaching profession and should not be seen as a wrong measure.
“We demand a series of reasonable complementary measures if reimposing the income tax is unavoidable,” Yeh said.
In 2002, the association successfully boycotted a plan to tax teachers, urging the then-Democratic Progressive Party government to carry out complementary measures before levying the tax.
Income taxes for primary school teachers have been suspended since 1955, while secondary school teachers have been exempted from taxes since 1979.
To ease the burden on teachers, Yeh said the association would agree to pay taxes if the Ministry of Education cut teachers’ workload by two classes a week, raised administrative and counseling fees and set up a teachers’ fund.
Lee said it was up to the ministry to determine whether the demands are reasonable.
“The monthly subsidies for homeroom teaching should also be raised by NT$2,000,” he said.
Yeh said teachers would also need more assistance to help them with administrative matters.
Additional reporting by Crystal Hsu
BUSINESS UPDATE: The iPhone assembler said operations outlook is expected to show quarter-on-quarter and year-on-year growth for the second quarter Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密) yesterday reported strong growth in sales last month, potentially raising expectations for iPhone sales while artificial intelligence (AI)-related business booms. The company, which assembles the majority of Apple Inc’s smartphones, reported a 19.03 percent rise in monthly sales to NT$510.9 billion (US$15.78 billion), from NT$429.22 billion in the same period last year. On a monthly basis, sales rose 14.16 percent, it said. The company in a statement said that last month’s revenue was a record-breaking April performance. Hon Hai, known also as Foxconn Technology Group (富士康科技集團), assembles most iPhones, but the company is diversifying its business to
ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE: The chipmaker last month raised its capital spending by 28 percent for this year to NT$32 billion from a previous estimate of NT$25 billion Contract chipmaker Powerchip Semiconductor Manufacturing Corp (力積電子) yesterday launched a new 12-inch fab, tapping into advanced chip-on-wafer-on-substrate (CoWoS) packaging technology to support rising demand for artificial intelligence (AI) devices. Powerchip is to offer interposers, one of three parts in CoWoS packaging technology, with shipments scheduled for the second half of this year, Powerchip chairman Frank Huang (黃崇仁) told reporters on the sidelines of a fab inauguration ceremony in the Tongluo Science Park (銅鑼科學園區) in Miaoli County yesterday. “We are working with customers to supply CoWoS-related business, utilizing part of this new fab’s capacity,” Huang said, adding that Powerchip intended to bridge
Microsoft Corp yesterday said that it would create Thailand’s first data center region to boost cloud and artificial intelligence (AI) infrastructure, promising AI training to more than 100,000 people to develop tech. Bangkok is a key economic player in Southeast Asia, but it has lagged behind Indonesia and Singapore when it comes to the tech industry. Thailand has an “incredible opportunity to build a digital-first, AI-powered future,” Microsoft chairman and chief executive officer Satya Nadella said at an event in Bangkok. Data center regions are physical locations that store computing infrastructure, allowing secure and reliable access to cloud platforms. The global embrace of AI
Qualcomm Inc, the world’s biggest seller of smartphone processors, gave an upbeat forecast for sales and profit in the current period, suggesting demand for handsets is increasing after a two-year slump. Revenue in the three months ended in June will be US$8.8 billion to US$9.6 billion, the company said in a statement Wednesday. Excluding certain items, earnings will be US$2.15 to US$2.35 a share. Analysts had projected sales of US$9.08 billion and earnings of US$2.16 a share. The outlook signals that the smartphone market has begun to bounce back, tracking with Qualcomm’s forecast that demand would gradually recover this year. The San