President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) yesterday urged businesses to raise employee wages, after announcing a 3 percent pay increase for Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) workers.
Tsai made the remarks at a DPP Central Standing Committee meeting in Taipei, where they had baozi (包子, bun) from a store in Changhua County’s Lugang Township (鹿港).
Praising the restaurant, A-Zen Bakery (阿振肉包), Tsai said that the proprietor, Cheng Yung-feng (鄭永豐), should be recognized for serving good food and for raising his employees’ wages by 20 percent consecutively for the past two years.
Photo: Fang Pin-chao, Taipei Times
Cheng last week gave his workers their latest pay raise, with the most junior employee at the restaurant getting a monthly pay of more than NT$40,000, she said.
The DPP’s decision this year to raise salaries by 3 percent was well-received by its workers, she said.
Business owners should not think of raising wages as a burdensome increase to their overhead, but as a way for them to share their joy with colleagues who have worked hard to grow their businesses, Tsai said.
A-Zen’s Bakery is not an exception, but a model to be emulated by other businesses in the nation, she said.
“We have been calling the public’s attention to businesses that are raising the salaries of their employees, because we want to show that there is a way for business owners and employees to work together for their mutual benefit,” she said.
The nation’s economy is taking a turn for the better and the administration will continue to improve the conditions for growth, Tsai said, adding that she hopes to see more business owners follow Cheng’s example.
“Taiwanese business owners should not stint on the wages of young and salaried workers; they will find that increasing employee morale brings growth and profit,” she said.
PACIFIC OCEAN: Defense experts have warned that the ‘Shandong,’ China’s second largest aircraft carrier, poses a serious threat to eastern Taiwan’s defenses The drills conducted by the Chinese aircraft carrier Shandong in the Western Pacific last week were more aimed at showcasing China’s military capabilities to the US rather than toward Taiwan, a Taiwanese defense expert said yesterday. Lin Yin-yu (林穎佑), an assistant professor at Tamkang University’s Graduate Institute of International Affairs and Strategic Studies, said the drills which involved dozens of warplanes sought to test China’s anti-access and area denial capabilities should the US and its allies attempt to interfere in a cross-strait conflict. Lin said that the latest Chinese drills coincided with a joint maritime exercise conducted by the US, South Korea
Thousands of bottles of Sriracha have been returned or destroyed after the discovery of excessive sulfur dioxide, a bleaching agent, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) announced on Tuesday. About 12,600 bottles totaling 9,991.8kg of the hot sauce imported from the US by Emporium Corp (河洛企業) were flagged at the border for containing illegal levels of sulfur dioxide, the FDA said in its regular border inspection announcement. Inspectors discovered 0.5g per kilogram of the common bleaching agent and preservative, higher than the 0.03g permitted, it said. As it is the first time within six months the product has been flagged, Sriracha products from
Two people were killed and another nine injured yesterday after being stung by hornets while hiking in New Taipei City’s Rueifang District (瑞芳), with officials warning against wearing perfume or straying from trails during the autumn to avoid the potentially deadly creatures. Seven of the hikers only sustained minor injuries after being stung along the Bafenliao Hiking Trail (八分寮) and made their way down the mountain with a guide, the New Taipei City Fire Department said. Four of them — all male — sustained more serious injuries and were assisted when leaving the mountain, the department said. Two of them, a man surnamed
CHANGES: While NCCU opened the nation’s first co-ed dorm in Mucha, a recent survey showed that Taiwanese are in favor of abolishing gender segregation at high schools National Chengchi University (NCCU) has opened a co-ed dormitory, a first in Taiwan among state-funded Taiwan universities. The 22 duplexes are at the renovated “Huanan New Village,” in Taipei City’s Mucha (木柵) area, near the NCCU campus, a school official said yesterday. Twenty-two out of 37 group applications were selected in a lottery draw to select who would be chosen to live in the units, which can either be shared by up to eight students if the unit has four bedrooms, or up to 10 students if it is a five-bedroom unit, officials said. Completed in 1964 for campus staff housing,
RSS