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President Hails New Retirement Pension Scheme
By Y.F. Low, Central News Agency
Taiwan
July 1, 2005
The new retirement pension scheme launched Friday in Taiwan marked a major step toward the establishment of a welfare state of fairness and justice, President Chen Shui-bian said. Addressing an event held by the Council of Labor Affairs to celebrate the inauguration of the scheme, Chen said the introduction of the retirement pension scheme in Taiwan is no less important than the implementation of the National Health Insurance program in 1995.
Chen expressed confidence that workers will offer their highest approval of the government for its effort in making this difficult task possible, although there is opposition among local businesses because of the increase in personnel costs.
Citing data from the Directorate General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics, Chen noted that salary and pay now account for 11.6 percent of the total expenditures of local businesses. The new scheme, which requires businesses to earmark an amount of 6 percent of their workers' monthly salary every month as their retirement funds, will only increase their total costs by 0.0069 percent but will benefit eight million workers and their families, Chen pointed out.
Furthermore, businesses will enjoy tax deductions for the amount of money they provide for workers' retirement funds, and the government will also provide NT$5 billion in credit guarantee funds for the businesses, Chen said.
The president urged the businesses not to worry too much and promised that the government will make available the necessary measures to help them cope with the new policy. He said the government still has a lot of things to do in the future in order to improve its care for the people, which include promoting a national pension program and taxation reforms as well as improving the National Health Insurance program.
He called on all political parties and various sectors of society to jointly create favorable conditions to facilitate the success of the reforms.
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