As male participation in parenting has not kept up with female participation in the workforce, the government should amend parental leave regulations, advocacy groups said on Tuesday.
The groups — including the Childcare Policy Alliance, the Birth Empowerment Alliance of Taiwan and the Awakening Foundation — cited studies showing that fewer men take parental leave, saying that this discourages women from having children. Legislation requiring employers to pay men on paternal leave 90 percent of their regular wages could curb this trend, they added. Other studies seem to back up the groups’ claims.
A study by Boston College’s Center for Work and Family found that men with an annual salary of US$100,000 or more were reluctant to take parental leave, but nearly all admitted that they would if they received full pay, a Feb. 19 article in the New York Times said.
California introduced legislation stipulating that employees on parental leave must receive 60 to 70 percent of their regular wages for up to six weeks, but the new law only induced a small increase in the number of men taking leave, the Times reported.
Men are most likely to take parental leave when they receive 70 percent or more of their salary, the article quoted researcher Brad Harrington as saying. At 90 percent of their salary, all of the men in his study would take parental leave, Harrington said, adding that men are concerned about earning enough to support their families, particularly while their wives are on leave to recover from giving birth.
Wages in Taiwan are low and while employers ease the pain of this with annual bonuses, men requesting parental leave might worry that their bonus could be affected, particularly when many Taiwanese are expected to work unpaid overtime and employees generally only leave the office after their bosses do.
There is still a gender gap in salaries, with a study released in March 2018 by the Ministry of Labor showing that women at the time earned 14 percent less than men.
The pay gap is significant enough that a male wage earner would need to continue receiving most of his regular salary if a couple expected to maintain their standard of living while he takes parental leave.
With the birthrate in Taiwan at record lows, the government knows that current parental leave regulations are a hurdle to promoting childbirth. In 2009, the Act of Gender Equality in Employment (性別工作平等法) was amended to allow those receiving unpaid parental leave from their employer in the first six months after a child’s birth to apply to the government for 60 percent of their wages.
On Dec. 4 last year, the Act of Assignment for Officers and Non-commissioned Officers of the Armed Forces (陸海空軍軍官士官任職條) was amended to allow those who have served in the military for at least six months to apply for parental leave.
However, Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Wan Mei-ling (萬美玲) in March said that parental leave regulations in the Labor Standards Act (勞動基準法) have not been revised for 36 years and fall below international standards.
Parental leave is crucial for both parents. The government should ensure that both can be with a newborn, to bond with the child and share in the parenting workload — while not being unduly affected financially. It is in the government’s interest to address this issue, which has such a direct impact on increasing the nation’s birthrate.
Many local news media over the past week have reported on Internet personality Holger Chen’s (陳之漢) first visit to China between Tuesday last week and yesterday, as remarks he made during a live stream have sparked wide discussions and strong criticism across the Taiwan Strait. Chen, better known as Kuan Chang (館長), is a former gang member turned fitness celebrity and businessman. He is known for his live streams, which are full of foul-mouthed and hypermasculine commentary. He had previously spoken out against the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and criticized Taiwanese who “enjoy the freedom in Taiwan, but want China’s money”
A high-school student surnamed Yang (楊) gained admissions to several prestigious medical schools recently. However, when Yang shared his “learning portfolio” on social media, he was caught exaggerating and even falsifying content, and his admissions were revoked. Now he has to take the “advanced subjects test” scheduled for next month. With his outstanding performance in the general scholastic ability test (GSAT), Yang successfully gained admissions to five prestigious medical schools. However, his university dreams have now been frustrated by the “flaws” in his learning portfolio. This is a wake-up call not only for students, but also teachers. Yang did make a big
As former president Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) concludes his fourth visit to China since leaving office, Taiwan finds itself once again trapped in a familiar cycle of political theater. The Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) has criticized Ma’s participation in the Straits Forum as “dancing with Beijing,” while the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) defends it as an act of constitutional diplomacy. Both sides miss a crucial point: The real question is not whether Ma’s visit helps or hurts Taiwan — it is why Taiwan lacks a sophisticated, multi-track approach to one of the most complex geopolitical relationships in the world. The disagreement reduces Taiwan’s
Former president Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) is visiting China, where he is addressed in a few ways, but never as a former president. On Sunday, he attended the Straits Forum in Xiamen, not as a former president of Taiwan, but as a former Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) chairman. There, he met with Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference Chairman Wang Huning (王滬寧). Presumably, Wang at least would have been aware that Ma had once been president, and yet he did not mention that fact, referring to him only as “Mr Ma Ying-jeou.” Perhaps the apparent oversight was not intended to convey a lack of
RSS