Tag: Labor and Jobs

Inside Taiwanese Chip Giant, a U.S. Expansion Stokes Tensions

Chin@Strategy

Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company, the world’s biggest maker of advanced computer chips, is upgrading and expanding a new factory in Arizona that promises to help move the United States toward a more self-reliant technological future. But to some at the company, the $40 billion project is something else: a bad business decision. Internal doubts are mounting at the Taiwanese chip maker over its U.S. factory, according to interviews with 11 TSMC employees, who declined to be identified because they were not authorized to speak publicly. Many of the workers said…

Ford Will Build a U.S. Battery Factory With Technology From China

Chin@Strategy

Ford Motor said on Monday that it planned to build a $3.5 billion electric-vehicle battery factory in Michigan using technology licensed from a Chinese company that has become one of the most important players in the auto industry. The plant, to be built in Marshall, a rural town about 100 miles west of Detroit, will be the latest in a growing list of new battery and electric-car factories that companies have announced in recent months. Ford expects to employ about 2,500 people at the plant and begin production in 2026.…

A Shrinking, Aging China May Have Backed Itself Into a Corner

Chin@Strategy

China’s leaders have long known that the country is nearing a demographic crossroads. Policymakers have warned that China must prepare for a slowly shrinking population and an era of fewer workers and more retirees. State media have urged young couples to seize the opportunity to have two or three children under relaxed family-size rules, to soften the looming economic crunch. And yet the sense of incipient crisis grew on Tuesday, when the government confirmed that the nation’s population shrank last year for the first time in six decades, sooner and…

Covid Workers in China Clash With Police Over Unpaid Wages, Layoffs

Chin@Strategy

After China’s abrupt reversal of “zero Covid” restrictions, the nation’s vast machinery of virus surveillance and testing collapsed, even as infections and deaths surged. Now, the authorities face another problem: Angry pandemic-control workers demanding wages and jobs. In the southwestern Chinese city of Chongqing, hundreds of workers locked in a pay dispute with a Covid test kit manufacturer hurled objects at police officers in riot gear, who held up shields as they retreated. Standing on stocks of inventory, protesters kicked and tossed boxes of rapid antigen tests on to the…

As Asian Societies Age, ‘Retirement’ Just Means More Work

Chin@Strategy

To cope with what demographers call “super aging societies,” policymakers in East Asia initially focused on trying to spur births and tinkering with immigration laws to shore up work forces. Such measures have done little to alter the aging trend line, as fertility rates have plunged and many countries have resisted large-scale immigration plans. That has left employers desperate for workers. In Japan, for example, surveys show that as many as half of companies report shortages of full-time workers. Older workers have stepped in to fill the gaps. “We have…

Why China’s Economy Faces a Perilous Road to Recovery

Chin@Strategy

Many European manufacturers in China have been forced to operate with about half their usual staff for two to three weeks, affecting output somewhat, said Klaus Zenkel, the chairman of the chamber’s South China chapter. As a precaution against lockdowns, many companies had accumulated spare parts in warehouses before the Covid wave and have relied on those to keep running. But to save on costs, a few small suppliers of specific components have stopped operations early for the Lunar New Year holiday, which starts on Jan. 21. “Everyone managed a…

China’s Young Elite Clamber for Government Jobs. Some Come to Regret It.

Chin@Strategy

In Beijing and cities across China, as many as 2.6 million job applicants, including graduates from the country’s top universities, will report to testing centers in early January to face exceedingly long odds and compete for 37,100 entry-level government jobs. The national exam is an annual rite for young Chinese, some of whom spend thousands of dollars for prep classes and many hours cramming for it. It comes at a fraught time. It was supposed to be given in early December, then was canceled at the last minute. The government…

The Numbers in the News

Chin@Strategy

Numbers that count 2 Two major central banks — the Bank of Japan and the People’s Bank of China — were the only ones not to raise interest rates this year, as inflation threatened economic growth and sapped consumer purchasing power. Central banks have collectively increased rates by more than 70 percent in 2022, according to LPL Financial, with the same goal: raise borrowing costs to cool rising prices that have been hitting shoppers from London to Poughkeepsie. Many were following the Fed, which increased its prime lending rate to…

China’s Youths, Stung by Years of Covid Rules, Fear Grim Job Future

Chin@Strategy

Mandy Liu, a 21-year-old university student in Beijing, believes that anyone who has lived in China during the pandemic can see that the country’s future is looking increasingly uncertain. Covid restrictions were stifling, and employment opportunities were grim. She is set to graduate next year with a degree in tourism management and has submitted more than 80 applications for jobs. She has not received a single offer. Many young people had followed what the Chinese Communist Party told them to do, only to be left disillusioned, Ms. Liu said. “What…

The Chinese Dream, Denied

Chin@Strategy

The narrow alleyways of Haizhu district have long beckoned to China’s strivers, people like Xie Pan, a textile worker from a mountainous tea-growing area in central China. Home to one of the country’s biggest fabric markets, Haizhu houses worker dormitories and textile factories in brightly colored buildings stacked so close that neighbors can shake hands out their windows. Once a smattering of rural villages, the area became a manufacturing hub as China opened its economy decades ago. The government had promised to step back and let people unleash their ambitions,…