A Pursuit of Housing Justice?

Written by Chieh-chi Hsieh. If anything is troubling the incumbent government led by the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), it would not be the external threats imposed by China. On the contrary, China’s continuous assertive actions toward Taiwan have become the DPP government’s greatest asset, enabling the mobilisation of domestic support observed after President Tsai’s National Day speech, which gathered 67.9% of residents’ approval based on a public survey.

Landlords, Subsidies, and Policy Failures: Renting in Taipei and New Taipei City

Written by Natalie Dai(戴淨妍), Jessica Hsu(徐卉馨), Sophia Lee(李昕儒), Dennis He(何正生); Translated by Sam Robbins. In August 2020, Lin Nuo-ning signed a half-year contract with her landlord and planned to stay in this apartment during her career move. However, when Nuo-ning applied for the subsidy for a second time, she received a call from her landlord whilst at work, criticising her for applying for the subsidy without telling her landlord first. As a result, her landlord asked her to move immediately. In applying for the subsidy, Nuo-ning had unintentionally caused the national tax bureau to contact her landlord to expect her tax records.

Location, Location, Location: Renting in Taipei and New Taipei City

Written by Natalie Dai(戴淨妍), Jessica Hsu(徐卉馨), Sophia Lee(李昕儒), Dennis He(何正生); Translated by Sam Robbins. For recent graduates like Yi-ting, mostly all renters, rent typically takes up between one quarter and one-third of their monthly income. According to the Ministry of Labour, the average monthly salary for recent graduates in 2019 was 28,231NTD (£724; $1021). Judging by mean rental prices per region, if they are willing to move out to the suburbs of New Taipei City, they can expect to pay around 8,000NTD (£205; $289) a month for an eight ping (26 square meters; 285 square feet) apartment.

Taiwan’s Real Estate Development from the Cross-Strait Perspective

Written by Wei-Che Fu and Yu-Chih Tseng. global economic and political geolocation, the challenges of its local industry development and social inequality were still ahead during the Sino-American conflicts. The mass capital escape from China is generally regarded as another chance for attracting investment. Taiwan experienced a new wave of housing inflation since the global financial crisis in 2008.

A Tale of Two Cities: Taiwan’s Social Housing Policy Practice in Taipei and Taoyuan City, 2014-2018

Written by Chris Chih-Hua Tseng. Taipei has spawned some policy innovations. Meanwhile, in Taoyuan, an adjacent developing city that has built massive amounts of social housing, none of the above happened. Instead, the city government proudly announced it had built social housing the fastest. Why has social housing developped much more sluggishly in the capital than it has in Taoyuan? To answer the differences between these two cities, we need to expand our scope to broader urban politics and urban developmental processes.