Taiwan's Ministry of Labor has revealed Thursday about its draft proposal amending the Labor Standards Act to stipulate a 40-day workweek, making two-day weekends a standard to all members of the private sectors by 2016.
The ministry's proposal is focused on amending Article 30 of the Labor Standards Act that indicates a current 84 regular hours per two weeks, which implies that a two-day weekend is not legally guaranteed.
Further, it also stipulates a change in the manner on how overtime hours are calculated, lowering the number of regular hours laborers are required to work in a week and creating a maximum of 12-hours-per-day labor in case overtime is required.
Should employees be required to work on holidays, the draft amendment proposes that they should be given compensatory vacation days or overtime pay.
Also, employees asked to report to work during days when work is canceled due to hazardous conditions, such as during the onslaught of a typhoon, should be reimbursed a week after and also be paid for rendering overtime.
Should the proposed amendment be passed into law, however, the maximum monthly overtime hours would be increased from the current 46 hours to 60 hours as a response to the employers' appeal to the ministry not to lessen overtime hours any further as it may hinder companies from meeting the needed manpower.
In the past, changes on the labor hours have become a subject of debate in Taiwan as some lawmakers explained that adjusting the standard work hours is complicated because the country's economy had relied heavily on manufacturing.
In a report from China Post, Lai Chang-yi, the head of the General Chamber of Commerce of the Republic of China, noted that changing the two-week 80-hour work schedule to only 40-hour weekly would "inevitably increase commercial expense" while benefiting the laborers.