Documents Taiwan 23 results

"Psychosocial factors, individual factors, workplace requirements, and workplace organizational factors have all been reported as being associated with the risk of musculoskeletal disorders [11]. Huang, Feuerstein, and Sauter [5] described the various concepts and models proposed to link occupational stress and work-related upper extremity disorders, as well as the difficulty in verifying the suggested linkages. Huang et al. [5] suggested that decomposing a complex model would be an appropriate method to begin the investigations of the proposed models. Task repetition is a workplace requirement that is considered a potential risk factor for cumulative trauma and its relationship to psychosocial factors was investigated. The study found only weak to no statistically significant relationship between task repetition and reported psychosocial factors of job stress in workers in Taiwan."

"This paper focuses on the changing governance of economic development in a globalizing era in relation to the dynamics of global value chains and global production networks. Based on recent development in such East Asian economies as South Korea, Taiwan and Singapore, I examine how, since the 1990s, the embedded relation between one variant of state institutions, known as the developmental state, and national firms, well integrated into global chains and networks spanning different territories and regions, has evolved. Because of the deepening strategic coupling of these national firms with lead firms in global industries, the developmental state's attempt to govern the market and to steer industrial transformation through direct policy interventions has become increasingly difficult and problematic. Through this process of strategic coupling, national firms have been gradually disembedded fromstate apparatuses and re-embedded in different global production networks that are governed by competitive inter-firm dynamics. While the state in these East Asian economies has actively repositioned its role in this changing governance, it can no longer be conceived as the dominant actor in steering domestic firms and industrial transformation. The developmental trajectory of these national economies becomes equally, if not more, dependent on the successful articulation of their domestic firms in global production networks spearheaded by lead firms. In short, inter-firm dynamics in global production networks tend to trump state-led initiatives as one of the most critical conditions for economic development. This paper theorizes further this significant role of global value chains and global production networks in the changing international political economy of development. "

"Work-related stress is a significant occupational health concern. There have been a growing number of studies examining policy-level responses to work-related stress but most of them were from high income-countries. While welfare state characteristics are known to influence the formulation of health policy, their influences on policy responses concerning stress-related health risks at work have rarely been explored. This study compared selected indicators of social and employment-related welfare state characteristics of Taiwan with other countries. Policy level interventions undertaken in Taiwan were also reviewed. Findings show that social and employment conditions of Taiwan are characterized by low level of public social expenditure, low unionization rate, low level of collective bargaining power of workers, low female and old-age labor participation rates and substantially long working hours. Since the early 1990s, the government of Taiwan has undertaken various types of policy actions. However, most of the interventions are individual oriented and focus on tertiary level. In recent years the function of labor inspection has been strengthened but still limited in implementation capacity. While international experiences are informative, a comprehensive understanding of sociopolitical context of any given country is essential for developing effective policy actions toward work-related stress."

"The world's leading economies, both developed and developing, are engaged in an ever-changing economic symbiosis that is governed in large part by demographics and technological change, but also by pension, healthcare, and other fiscal policies. This interconnected economic evolution—what economists call general equilibrium growth—holds important implications for inequality across and within generations. This paper presents such a general equilibrium model. It features six goods, five regions, three skill groups, and 91 overlapping generations, each making life-cycle consumption and labour-supply decisions. The model pays special attention to the evolution of the Chinese and Indian economies. Thanks to their rapid technological advance and vast populations, these nations will play an ever more dominant role in determining the world's supplies of capital and labour, particularly unskilled labour. The good news for the developed world is that China and India will supply it with major amounts of capital over time, thanks to their high saving rates. The bad news is that these economies are also likely to bring much more unskilled relative to skilled labour into the market, which will, over time, dramatically reduce the relative wages of unskilled workers in the US, Europe, and Japan. This relative increase in the world supply of unskilled workers reflects, in large part, the simple fact that China and India are gradually bringing each of their skill groups up to Western standards, but have relatively more unskilled labour in their work forces."

"This article is about factory regimes and more particularly about changes in factory regimes in East Asia. Its point of departure is Burawoy's early and highly influential contribution to the understanding of factory regimes (Burawoy, 1985), which has very often been associated with the idea of ‘hegemonic despotism' and increased attempts by management at ideological control. The article seeks to go beyond this particular interpretation. Theoretically, it seeks to make explicit and in one case expand elements in Burawoy's original work by distinguishing three aspects of labour regimes: labour control, material support and contract. It then considers three factories in China, Taiwan and South Korea in the light of this reformulation and, by paying due regard to issues related to material support and contract, and not only to control, it advances the claim that some of the most significant changes that are occurring amount in each case to the dismantling of established labour – that is, labour that is generally permanent and relatively privileged not only with respect to wages but usually also other forms of material support."

"For safe job design, it is necessary to know the maximum acceptable work time (MAWT) for a given workload. The aim was to establish the relationship between MAWT and physical workload. Cycling tests at six different work rates relative to personal maximum working capacity were performed by 12 young adults in the laboratory. The oxygen uptake (VO2) in the per cent maximum aerobic capacity (%VO2max), relative heart rate (RHR) and relative oxygen uptake (RVO2) were collected throughout the test. MAWT was determined by observing the heart rate data during the test. The results showed that MAWT was negatively correlated with %VO2max, RHR and RVO2 (p <0.01). Three exponential regression models were obtained and all their R2 >0.80. These models suggest that long-hour shifts (>10 h) should assign a lower work intensity than for an 8-h workday. It is also logical that the workload limit for a 4-h work shift could be set at about 10% VO2max higher than the suggested limit for an 8-h workday."