David Huang thinks he knows where the Taiwanese should best invest

Conference on Sustaining Taiwan's Economic Development: Cross-strait issues hotly debated if finance meeting

The discussion on investments in China sparked heavy debate in the the conference in the face of strong opposition from Taiwan Solidarity Union (TSU) lawmakers.

TSU caucus whip David Huang (黃適卓) and Legislator Lo Chih-ming (羅志明) voiced strong opposition to any relaxation measures, saying overheated investment in the "enemy country" had triggered capital outflow, deprived people of jobs and jeopardized national security and sovereignty.

Conference on Sustaining Taiwan's Economic Development: Social group proposes national pension law

The growing gap between the rich and the poor was another topic of intense discussion, with the session concluding that the government would provide more opportunities for minority families.

Taiwan Solidarity Union Legislator David Huang (黃適卓) told the participants that the root of the widening gap was that more people were investing in China, causing stagnation among middle to lower income levels.

I don't believe any politician in any country should be telling people where to invest. You might think this is just populist or leftist economic bossiness, but David Huang is son of the party chairman Huang Chu-wen (黃主文). Tsai Hung-chang (蔡鴻章) has accused the Taiwan Solidarity Union (which means Huang Chu-wen, right?) of making unfair nominations, and has accused Huang Jr. of crowding him out.

TSU Secretary-General Lin Chih-chia (林志嘉) said that, since the TSU was a small party, it was not necessarily more fair to conduct opinion polls to select candidates. He said the review of candidates had been objective and open.

It sounds like typical Chinese corrupt practice.

Then Pan-blues, business rebuke MAC for axing China issues

The pan-blue camp, joined by business groups and some academics, yesterday harshly criticized the Mainland Affairs Council's decision to leave a relaxation of the China-bound investment cap and direct cross-strait flights off the agenda for the economic conference that opens today, saying that the move would hamper the nation's economic development...

Kenneth Lin (林向愷), an economics professor at National Taiwan University, said the government was doing a poor job of improving the investment environment as the investment volumes by home-grown industries indicated that the nation was lagging behind the other three Asian tigers -- Singapore, Hong Kong and South Korea.

Kung Ming-hsin (龔明鑫), vice president of the Taiwan Institute of Economic Research (台經院), said the 40 percent cap, which had been ineffective in slowing the flow of capital to China, had actually become a burden to the Taiwanese economy.

"The government has the ability to review the effectiveness of this policy and come up with a more effective mechanism. [Low-end] industries which want to move to China should be allowed to go. But [high-end technology industries] should not be allowed to invest even one percent of their capital in China," Kung said.