The push by the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) to suspend pension reforms amounts to “robbing the poor to give to the rich,” resulting in wider income gaps, and injustice against farmers and laborers, the Economic Democracy Union (EDU) said.
EDU members protested outside the legislature yesterday, a day after the bill to suspend pension reforms passed its first reading with backing from the Taiwan People’s Party.
The bill would roll back reforms to the pension system launched by the Democratic Progressive Party government in 2017, which was aimed at securing solvency for the state pension fund, as the previous pension scheme allowed civil servants, military personnel and teachers to “contribute little, retire early and receive generous benefits” at the expense of other workers and farmers, the activist group said.
Photo: Tien Yu-hua, Taipei Times
EDU researcher Huang Ting-wei (黃亭偉) said that retired public school teachers receive an average monthly pension of NT$57,973, while civil servants get a monthly average of NT$50,395.
The government defines the lowest standard of living expenses this year as requiring NT$20,379 per month in Taipei and NT$15,515 elsewhere, with incomes below these figures considered to be low-income households, Huang said.
“Civil servants and teachers — retired and not working — are getting more than NT$50,000 from their pensions, above the average salary, yet the pensioners claim to be poor and to have difficulty living, and so they fight pension reform,” he said.
“Taiwan’s more than 500,000 farmers receive only a monthly average of NT$8,110 in retirement benefits,” Huang added.
“More than 1.9 million working class retirees receive an average of NT$25,300 in retirement benefits. Of these, more than 180,000 retired workers are getting by on a monthly pension of less than NT$10,000,” he said.
Huang said that at the end of last year, Taiwan had 4.48 million people over the age of 65, with about half of them receiving less than NT$8,000 in retirement benefits.
“This NT$8,000 is far below the NT$50,000 received by retired civil servants,” Huang added.
The legislature should amend the Act Governing the Allocation of Government Revenues and Expenditures (財政收支劃分法) to guarantee a minimum monthly retirement benefit of NT$8,000 for all citizens without regard to occupation, the EDU said.
AGING: While Japan has 22 submarines, Taiwan only operates four, two of which were commissioned by the US in 1945 and 1946, and transferred to Taiwan in 1973 Taiwan would need at least 12 submarines to reach modern fleet capabilities, CSBC Corp, Taiwan chairman Chen Cheng-hung (陳政宏) said in an interview broadcast on Friday, citing a US assessment. CSBC is testing the nation’s first indigenous defense submarine, the Hai Kun (海鯤, Narwhal), which is scheduled to be delivered to the navy next month or in July. The Hai Kun has completed torpedo-firing tests and is scheduled to undergo overnight sea trials, Chen said on an SET TV military affairs program. Taiwan would require at least 12 submarines to establish a modern submarine force after assessing the nation’s operational environment and defense
A white king snake that frightened passengers and caused a stir on a Taipei MRT train on Friday evening has been claimed by its owner, who would be fined, Taipei Rapid Transit Corp (TRTC) said yesterday. A person on Threads posted that he thought he was lucky to find an empty row of seats on Friday after boarding a train on the Bannan (Blue) Line, only to spot a white snake with black stripes after sitting down. Startled, he jumped up, he wrote, describing the encounter as “terrifying.” “Taipei’s rat control plan: Release snakes on the metro,” one person wrote in reply, referring
The coast guard today said that it had disrupted "illegal" operations by a Chinese research ship in waters close to the nation and driven it away, part of what Taipei sees a provocative pattern of China's stepped up maritime activities. The coast guard said that it on Thursday last week detected the Chinese ship Tongji (同濟號), which was commissioned only last year, 29 nautical miles (54km) southeast of the southern tip of Taiwan, although just outside restricted waters. The ship was observed lowering ropes into the water, suspected to be the deployment of scientific instruments for "illegal" survey operations, and the coast
An inauguration ceremony was held yesterday for the Danjiang Bridge, the world’s longest single-mast asymmetric cable-stayed bridge, ahead of its official opening to traffic on Tuesday, marking a major milestone after nearly three decades of planning and construction. At the ceremony in New Taipei City attended by President William Lai (賴清德), Premier Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰), Minister of Transportation and Communications Chen Shih-kai (陳世凱) and New Taipei City Mayor Hou Yu-ih (侯友宜), the bridge was hailed as both an engineering landmark and a long-awaited regional transport link connecting Tamsui (淡水) and Bali (八里)
RSS