A majority of the public hopes that pension reform can be completed by the end of this year, with policies put forward by the Pension Reform Committee garnering widespread support from public and private-sector workers younger than 40, the results of a survey released yesterday by the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) found.
Overall, 70.4 percent of respondents said that they want pension reform to be accomplished before next year, while 25.9 percent stated the opposite view.
However, when broken down into private-sector workers and public-sector workers, only 44.2 percent of public-sector workers were in favor of the reform, while 55.8 percent were against it, while 72.5 percent of private-sector workers supported reform, as opposed to 25.1 percent against.
Photo: CNA
Public-sector workers were more supportive of forming a “sustainable pension system that the government can afford that ensures all present and future retirees would receive their pensions,” with 88 percent of them responding positively to the idea, compared with the 86.8 percent registered by private-sector workers, the results showed.
A majority of private-sector workers and public-sector workers, 90.3 percent and 77.2 percent respectively, said they would like the pension system to be reviewed every five or 10 years to ensure that it is financially sound, while 19.7 percent of public-sector workers and 8 percent of private-sector workers had the contrary opinion, the survey found.
The proposed “transferable pension” system, which allows the pensions private-sector workers have accrued to be added to the amount of time they serve as a public servant, if they make such a transition, similarly won nonpartisan support from both private-sector workers and public-sector workers, registering support ratings of 87 percent and 89.6 percent respectively, the poll showed.
Categorized by age group, about 70 percent of public-sector workers under 40 expressed approval of the policies put forward by the committee so far, the results showed.
They include plans to gradually increase the labor insurance premium from 12 percent to 18 percent to prevent the pension system from going bankrupt, and to gradually phase out the 18 percent preferential savings interest rate enjoyed by public-sector workers hired before 1995.
Asked how the government would address detractors of pension reform, DPP spokesman Yang Chia-liang (楊家俍) said that it would focus on debunking rumors and erroneous information being disseminated on social media to boost the public’s confidence in reform.
A DPP source said that the survey also showed growing support for President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) after her administration had laid out its pension reforms.
The party’s latest survey found that Tsai had an approval rating of 43.9 percent after a national convention on pension reform.
The survey, conducted among Taiwanese aged at least 20, collected 1,009 valid samples nationwide, with a 95 percent confidence level and a 3.1 percent margin of error.
Additional reporting by CNA
A Ministry of Foreign Affairs official yesterday said that a delegation that visited China for an APEC meeting did not receive any kind of treatment that downgraded Taiwan’s sovereignty. Department of International Organizations Director-General Jonathan Sun (孫儉元) said that he and a group of ministry officials visited Shenzhen, China, to attend the APEC Informal Senior Officials’ Meeting last month. The trip went “smoothly and safely” for all Taiwanese delegates, as the Chinese side arranged the trip in accordance with long-standing practices, Sun said at the ministry’s weekly briefing. The Taiwanese group did not encounter any political suppression, he said. Sun made the remarks when
The Taiwanese passport ranked 33rd in a global listing of passports by convenience this month, rising three places from last month’s ranking, but matching its position in January last year. The Henley Passport Index, an international ranking of passports by the number of designations its holder can travel to without a visa, showed that the Taiwan passport enables holders to travel to 139 countries and territories without a visa. Singapore’s passport was ranked the most powerful with visa-free access to 192 destinations out of 227, according to the index published on Tuesday by UK-based migration investment consultancy firm Henley and Partners. Japan’s and
BROAD AGREEMENT: The two are nearing a trade deal to reduce Taiwan’s tariff to 15% and a commitment for TSMC to build five more fabs, a ‘New York Times’ report said Taiwan and the US have reached a broad consensus on a trade deal, the Executive Yuan’s Office of Trade Negotiations said yesterday, after a report said that Washington is set to reduce Taiwan’s tariff rate to 15 percent. The New York Times on Monday reported that the two nations are nearing a trade deal to reduce Taiwan’s tariff rate to 15 percent and commit Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) to building at least five more facilities in the US. “The agreement, which has been under negotiation for months, is being legally scrubbed and could be announced this month,” the paper said,
MIXED SOURCING: While Taiwan is expanding domestic production, it also sources munitions overseas, as some, like M855 rounds, are cheaper than locally made ones Taiwan and the US plan to jointly produce 155mm artillery shells, as the munition is in high demand due to the Ukraine-Russia war and should be useful in Taiwan’s self-defense, Armaments Bureau Director-General Lieutenant General Lin Wen-hsiang (林文祥) told lawmakers in Taipei yesterday. Lin was responding to questions about Taiwan’s partnership with allies in producing munitions at a meeting of the legislature’s Foreign Affairs and National Defense Committee. Given the intense demand for 155mm artillery shells in Ukraine’s defense against the Russian invasion, and in light of Taiwan’s own defensive needs, Taipei and Washington plan to jointly produce 155mm shells, said Lin,
RSS