ECONOMY
Cabinet mulls new tax
The Executive Yuan said yesterday it is planning to levy a “rich man’s tax” in a bid to narrow a widening gap between the nation’s haves and have-nots. The Cabinet, which has set up a task force charged with finding ways to reduce the income gap, said in a statement it would soon announce proposals to levy the tax on high-end products, services and trade aimed at the rich. Various government figures indicate that the country’s once relatively equal society is gradually experiencing a more unequal distribution of income. In the period from April to June, the number of Taiwanese households living in poverty rose 10,000 from a year earlier to a high of 108,000, despite economic growth. The most prosperous 20 percent reported average disposable incomes of NT$1.79 million (US$56,000) last year, or 6.34 times more than the income of the poorest 20 percent, government figures show.
ENVIRONMENT
CTSP expansion resumed
Expansion work resumed at the Central Taiwan Science Park (CTSP) in Siangsihliao (相思寮) in Changhua County’s Erlin Township (二林) on Wednesday after a disruption of nearly two months over a legal dispute arising from environmental concerns, park authorities said. On the back of a court ruling allowing the development project to continue, the Central Taiwan Science Park Administration said it needed to act swiftly to meet deadlines and accommodate companies in the compound. The expansion project was halted by the Taipei High Administrative Court on July 30 after environmental groups filed a lawsuit questioning the government’s latest environmental impact assessment. The Environmental Protection Administration appealed the ruling on Aug. 9 and the Supreme Administrative Court overruled the verdict on Sept. 2, asking the lower court to review the case. The agency said agreements had been reached with residents of the Siangsihliao community and farmers who owned land inside the park. The Siangsihliao residential area will be preserved, while farmers can exchange their land for land outside the park, it said.
INTERNET
Matsu-tracking offered
A Web site featuring a tracking service has been launched to help followers of Matsu (媽祖) participate virtually in the sea goddess’ upcoming annual tour, Chunghwa Telecom (CHT) said yesterday. The tour features thousands of followers who accompany a statue of Matsu borne on a palanquin on a journey around many towns and villages in central Taiwan. The palanquin itself has been equipped with a GPS device, so that the Web site (showtaiwan.hinet.net/chmazu2010) can display its real-time location throughout the tour, the company said in a statement. The goddess will visit 11 Matsu temples in Changhua County from tomorrow through next Saturday. It is the second time CHT has provided the service.
TOURISM
Travel bloggers wanted
A travel agency launched a contest yesterday to encourage travel bloggers to apply for what it called “the best job in the world” — reviewing local hotels during a sponsored free stay in Taiwan. The winner of the two-month-long competition will be able to spend a year staying in 52 different hotels for up to a week at a time and will receive NT$10,000 (US$320) in cash per month to visit tourist attractions, said the organizer, Lion Travel Service. Interested applicants for the job can submit their travel blogs to blog.liontravel.com/event/hotel/join.aspx by Oct. 17.
A group of Taiwanese-American and Tibetan-American students at Harvard University on Saturday disrupted Chinese Ambassador to the US Xie Feng’s (謝鋒) speech at the school, accusing him of being responsible for numerous human rights violations. Four students — two Taiwanese Americans and two from Tibet — held up banners inside a conference hall where Xie was delivering a speech at the opening ceremony of the Harvard Kennedy School China Conference 2024. In a video clip provided by the Coalition of Students Resisting the CCP (Chinese Communist Party), Taiwanese-American Cosette Wu (吳亭樺) and Tibetan-American Tsering Yangchen are seen holding banners that together read:
UNAWARE: Many people sit for long hours every day and eat unhealthy foods, putting them at greater risk of developing one of the ‘three highs,’ an expert said More than 30 percent of adults aged 40 or older who underwent a government-funded health exam were unaware they had at least one of the “three highs” — high blood pressure, high blood lipids or high blood sugar, the Health Promotion Administration (HPA) said yesterday. Among adults aged 40 or older who said they did not have any of the “three highs” before taking the health exam, more than 30 percent were found to have at least one of them, Adult Preventive Health Examination Service data from 2022 showed. People with long-term medical conditions such as hypertension or diabetes usually do not
POLICE INVESTIGATING: A man said he quit his job as a nurse at Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital as he had been ‘disgusted’ by the behavior of his colleagues A man yesterday morning wrote online that he had witnessed nurses taking photographs and touching anesthetized patients inappropriately in Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital’s operating theaters. The man surnamed Huang (黃) wrote on the Professional Technology Temple bulletin board that during his six-month stint as a nurse at the hospital, he had seen nurses taking pictures of patients, including of their private parts, after they were anesthetized. Some nurses had also touched patients inappropriately and children were among those photographed, he said. Huang said this “disgusted” him “so much” that “he felt the need to reveal these unethical acts in the operating theater
Heat advisories were in effect for nine administrative regions yesterday afternoon as warm southwesterly winds pushed temperatures above 38°C in parts of southern Taiwan, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. As of 3:30pm yesterday, Tainan’s Yujing District (玉井) had recorded the day’s highest temperature of 39.7°C, though the measurement will not be included in Taiwan’s official heat records since Yujing is an automatic rather than manually operated weather station, the CWA said. Highs recorded in other areas were 38.7°C in Kaohsiung’s Neimen District (內門), 38.2°C in Chiayi City and 38.1°C in Pingtung’s Sandimen Township (三地門), CWA data showed. The spell of scorching