Taiwan Tati Cultural and Educational Foundation

This time every year the press decide on one word that best represents the previous 12 months. They have yet to come up with one for this year, but here is one for the coming year: chaos.

Taiwan now consists of five special municipalities and 17 counties, with 60 percent of the population living within the former. The implications for how finances are to be divvied up are horrendous. The newly-elected mayors of these municipalities inherit huge debts, and to fulfill campaign promises they are going to need to go cap in hand to the central government for cash, personnel and other resources. The 17 counties will be allocated a smaller portion of the pie and will see their subsidies fall. The five municipalities already exist, but the legislation concerning the allocation of finances, namely the Act Governing the Allocation of Government Revenues and Expenditures (財政收支劃分法) and the Public Debt Act (公債法), are held up in the legislature, waiting for amendments. This means a worsening of the disparity between urban and rural areas, and between rich and poor.

This continues the post of December 5th (scroll back to see it) when AIT Chairman Raymond Burghardt spoke to the American Chamber of Commerce in Taiwan. Burghardt praised Taiwan as the 9th largest trading partner of the USA with a 2-way volume of 46 billion US$. Unsaid was how the USA has helped Taiwan (the Republic of China) militarily in a wide variety of ways for over a half a century. And yet by the end of his speech, after stating proudly that Taiwan should have confidence in its role in the world, Burghardt said that the official position of the USA on Taiwan was "no position." Say what???