Average monthly take-home pay in February increased 2.52 percent from a year earlier to NT$45,917, while total wages — which includes overtime pay, performance-based commissions and bonuses — soared 54.84 percent to NT$81,576 on the back of Lunar New Year bonuses, the Directorate-General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics (DGBAS) said yesterday.
Taiwanese firms on average issued Lunar New Year bonuses equivalent to 1.69 months of regular wages, or NT$77,348, the highest in nine years and up from 1.68 months a year earlier, Census Department Deputy Director Chen Hui-hsin (陳惠欣) said.
“The improvement came after service providers benefited from sustained revenge consumption in the post-COVID-19 pandemic era, although manufacturers took a hit from a global slowdown,” Chen told a news conference.
Photo: CNA
Financial and insurance companies offered the highest bonuses, averaging 3.64 months of wages, or NT$251,402, she said.
Manufacturers distributed 2.11 months of year-end bonuses, lower than the 2.14 months last year, she said, adding that suppliers of electronic components gave 2.76 months of bonuses, also weaker than 2.8 months a year earlier.
Exporters of tech and non-tech products had idle capacities and headcounts last year as they grappled with business declines induced by inventory adjustments and global inflation, Chen said.
Recreational facilities, hotels and restaurants fared better, issuing bonuses of 0.44 months to 0.74 months, compared with smaller bonuses or none last year, she said.
In the first two months of this year, regular take-home pay rose 2.39 percent annually to NT$46,017, while overall wages expanded 3.74 percent to NT$81,982, she said.
Real take-home wages after inflation remained in positive territory for the first time in two years with a 1.29 percent uptick as inflation pressure eased, Chen said.
The timing of the holiday also played a role, as local companies sometimes distribute year-end bonuses in December when the Lunar New Year is in January, she said.
Regular monthly wages have a fair chance of beating inflation due to the wage hikes and consumer price data, Chen said.
Holiday disruptions also explained why the number of workers hired in the industrial and service sectors in February shrank 0.25 percent, or about 21,000 people, compared with January, the DGBAS said.
Most firms halted operations for the holiday, it said.
As a result, the accession rate in February shed 0.07 percentage points to 2.04 percent, while the dropout rate gained 0.24 percentage points to 2.29 percent, it said.
AI REVOLUTION: The event is to take place from Wednesday to Friday at the Taipei Nangang Exhibition Center’s halls 1 and 2 and would feature more than 1,100 exhibitors Semicon Taiwan, an annual international semiconductor exhibition, would bring leaders from the world’s top technology firms to Taipei this year, the event organizer said. The CEO Summit is to feature nine global leaders from Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), ASE Technology Holding Co (ASE, 日月光投控), Applied Materials Inc, Google, Samsung Electronics Co, SK Hynix Inc, Microsoft Corp, Interuniversity Microelectronic Centre and Marvell Technology Group Ltd, SEMI said in a news release last week. The top executives would delve into how semiconductors are positioned as the driving force behind global technological innovation amid the artificial intelligence (AI) revolution, the organizer said. Among them,
Demand for artificial intelligence (AI) chips should spur growth for the semiconductor industry over the next few years, the CEO of a major supplier to Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) said, dismissing concerns that investors had misjudged the pace and extent of spending on AI. While the global chip market has grown about 8 percent annually over the past 20 years, AI semiconductors should grow at a much higher rate going forward, Scientech Corp (辛耘) chief executive officer Hsu Ming-chi (許明琪) told Bloomberg Television. “This booming of the AI industry has just begun,” Hsu said. “For the most prominent
Former Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) chairman Mark Liu (劉德音) yesterday warned against the tendency to label stakeholders as either “pro-China” or “pro-US,” calling such rigid thinking a “trap” that could impede policy discussions. Liu, an adviser to the Cabinet’s Economic Development Committee, made the comments in his keynote speech at the committee’s first advisers’ meeting. Speaking in front of Premier Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰), National Development Council (NDC) Minister Paul Liu (劉鏡清) and other officials, Liu urged the public to be wary of falling into the “trap” of categorizing people involved in discussions into either the “pro-China” or “pro-US” camp. Liu,
Minister of Economic Affairs J.W. Kuo (郭智輝) yesterday said Taiwan’s government plans to set up a business service company in Kyushu, Japan, to help Taiwanese companies operating there. “The company will follow the one-stop service model similar to the science parks we have in Taiwan,” Kuo said. “As each prefecture is providing different conditions, we will establish a new company providing services and helping Taiwanese companies swiftly settle in Japan.” Kuo did not specify the exact location of the planned company but said it would not be in Kumamoto, the Kyushu prefecture in which Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC, 台積電) has a
RSS