Employees at the Ministry of Health and Welfare’s (MOHW) 26 hospitals nationwide are to get a 4 percent pay raise effective January next year, while nurses at 21 of those hospitals would have received additional pay increases by the end of this month.
The across-the-board 4 percent pay raise in January is aimed at addressing an acute employee shortage at MOHW medical institutions, Yang Nan-ping (楊南屏), deputy executive director of the ministry’s Hospital and Social Welfare Organizations Administration Commission, said yesterday.
The shortage has been aggravated by fierce competition from private hospitals in recent months. Chang Gung Memorial Hospital, Cheng Hsin General Hospital, Far Eastern Memorial Hospital and Shin Kong Wu Ho-Su Memorial Hospital have all increased their salaries this year, and Cathay General Hospital and Taiwan Adventist Hospital are to follow suit next year, he said.
Photo: Lin Hui-chin, Taipei Times
MOHW hospitals have already taken steps this year to retain their nurses, Yang said.
In March, they were given an average monthly retention bonus of NT$3,000 (US$93.33) and a night shift bonus of NT$1,850 per month, as well as a special ward subsidy of NT$1,600 to NT$2,500 per month and a monthly certificate allowance of NT$2,000, he said.
Those increases brought annual pay for MOHW hospital nurses to NT$648,000 to NT$920,000, he said.
Photo: Rachel Lin, Taipei Times
Eighteen MOHW hospitals last month also raised the monthly shift allowances for nurses by NT$800 to NT$2,000, and another three are to follow suit this month, he said.
The 4 percent increase in January would benefit 8,026 MOHW hospital nurses, raising their monthly pay by NT$1,500 to NT$2,500, which would increase the hospitals’ expenses by at least NT$140 million per year, he said.
The Ministry of Education yesterday also rolled out a five-year NT$33.29 billion program covering pay hikes and support for research programs at universities and higher education institutions.
Part of the package would provide financial support for privately run universities to close the salary gap with public universities.
Starting next year, the monthly salaries of professors, associate professors and assistant professors are to rise by NT$9,350, NT$7,220 and NT$6,320 respectively, benefiting an estimated 18,000 faculty members at public universities, said Chu Chun-chang (朱俊彰), head of the ministry’s Department of Higher Education.
The education ministry has also allocated NT$340 million to expand scholarships and stipends for about 1,200 doctoral students next year, which are to be disbursed according each university’s own criteria.
The education ministry added that it plans to offer subsidies for on-campus housing for students at public and private universities.
A monthly subsidy ranging from NT$1,200 to NT$1,500 is being discussed and could be introduced as early as February next year if the proposal is approved by the Executive Yuan, it said, adding that it is expected to benefit 260,000 students.
Tropical Storm Usagi strengthened to a typhoon yesterday morning and remains on track to brush past southeastern Taiwan from tomorrow to Sunday, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. As of 2pm yesterday, the storm was approximately 950km east-southeast of Oluanpi (鵝鑾鼻), Taiwan proper’s southernmost point, the CWA said. It is expected to enter the Bashi Channel and then turn north, moving into waters southeast of Taiwan, it said. The agency said it could issue a sea warning in the early hours of today and a land warning in the afternoon. As of 2pm yesterday, the storm was moving at
DISCONTENT: The CCP finds positive content about the lives of the Chinese living in Taiwan threatening, as such video could upset people in China, an expert said Chinese spouses of Taiwanese who make videos about their lives in Taiwan have been facing online threats from people in China, a source said yesterday. Some young Chinese spouses of Taiwanese make videos about their lives in Taiwan, often speaking favorably about their living conditions in the nation compared with those in China, the source said. However, the videos have caught the attention of Chinese officials, causing the spouses to come under attack by Beijing’s cyberarmy, they said. “People have been messing with the YouTube channels of these Chinese spouses and have been harassing their family members back in China,”
The Central Weather Administration (CWA) yesterday said there are four weather systems in the western Pacific, with one likely to strengthen into a tropical storm and pose a threat to Taiwan. The nascent tropical storm would be named Usagi and would be the fourth storm in the western Pacific at the moment, along with Typhoon Yinxing and tropical storms Toraji and Manyi, the CWA said. It would be the first time that four tropical cyclones exist simultaneously in November, it added. Records from the meteorology agency showed that three tropical cyclones existed concurrently in January in 1968, 1991 and 1992.
GEOPOLITICAL CONCERNS: Foreign companies such as Nissan, Volkswagen and Konica Minolta have pulled back their operations in China this year Foreign companies pulled more money from China last quarter, a sign that some investors are still pessimistic even as Beijing rolls out stimulus measures aimed at stabilizing growth. China’s direct investment liabilities in its balance of payments dropped US$8.1 billion in the third quarter, data released by the Chinese State Administration of Foreign Exchange showed on Friday. The gauge, which measures foreign direct investment (FDI) in China, was down almost US$13 billion for the first nine months of the year. Foreign investment into China has slumped in the past three years after hitting a record in 2021, a casualty of geopolitical tensions,
RSS