Feb 18, 2009

Ma’s Policies Make Taiwan's Recession Deeper and Wider

Taiwan's GDP is projected to contract for three more quarters --- 6.51 percent in the first quarter, another 6.85 percent in the second quarter, and 2.67 percent in the third -- before swinging back to a rise of 4.50 percent in the fourth quarter.

"This is likely to be the longest recession in Taiwan's history so far," Shih Su-mei, [Minister of the Directorate-General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics], told reporters.
From Agence France-Presse (AFP) story:
Taiwan in recession as economy contracts record 8.36 pct

Wed Feb 18, 7:53 AM
Commentary

Ma Ying-jeou’s government has tried hard to make a “disabled” Ma look “good.”


First, Ma’s government, making all kinds of policies only to show off “homework done” without any deliberate planning, has not and never will confess any wrong doing or wrong policies that have pushed Taiwan toward a deeper and longer recession. With the recession so clear and near, Ma’s government is still using “+5.8% growth” as the basis for its 2009 budget while everyone has warned that Taiwan will actually have a negative growth for the next few years.

Besides that, to make Ma look “superb”, his government lowers the income level of poverty, so the numbers of the poor suddenly drop as the numbers of families who can’t afford to take care of the ill and handicapped increase dramatically. In fact, businesses are facing financial difficulty just as Ma tells people to be as frugal as "he is" and as the government raises each of the three utility bills.

The KMT makes the Taiwanese. i.e. the DPP and on former President Chen Shui-bian "Abian", who have little power or are in jail, respectively, the easy scapegoats. As soon as Ma steps up, the economy in Taiwan steps down. To make use of the United States, as the KMT always does, the KMT people in Taiwan are blaming this recession on the US market. That indeed is part of the problem but connecting at the hip with China, as Ma has been so eager for Taiwan to do, is at least equally causitive.

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