Women and Industry in Taiwan

One of the factors underlying Taiwan’s industrial growth over the past two decades has been the availability of a pool of underemployed, young workers who will accept relatively low wages, who are unlikely to raise demands for higher pay, shorter hours, or seniority benefits and who, in many instances, expect only short-term employment. Women are a significant segment of this industrial work force. By the start of the 1970s, at least 20 % of the employed population over the age of 15 was engaged in manufacturing. Of these, 33 % were women, most of whom were between the ages of 15 and 25 (Taiwan Provincial Labor Force Survey and Research Institute, 1971). While their male counterparts, also relatively young, held an expectation of continuous employment, increased skill-learning and job advancement within the factory workplace, the women workers were more likely to see their jobs as a brief interim between