Taiwan faces a shrinking working-age population (ages 15-64) due to an aging society and low fertility rates, leading to labor shortages in manufacturing, hospitality and other industries. At the same time, public concern over low wages for the local workforce is growing. To address these challenges, the government is launching a plan in 2026 to enhance the use of transnational labor. This initiative encourages businesses to raise wages and improve employment conditions for local workers, preventing wage stagnation while actively attracting transnational labor to help fill labor market gaps. Guided by the principles of prioritizing local workers' rights, improving workforce quality, expanding recruitment and retention efforts, and enhancing government efficiency, the plan seeks to meet industry labor needs while fostering a system that benefits both employers and employees.
Four key measures
■ Link expansion of migrant worker quota to wage increases for local workers in the manufacturing sector: To encourage higher wages for local workers, a manufacturing employer may hire one additional migrant worker for each full-time local employee who is granted a salary increase of at least NT$2,000 (US$64.35), with the number of additional hires capped at 10% of the employer's labor-insurance enrollees.
■ Remove cap on skilled foreign workers: To help businesses retain experienced, high-performing migrant workers, employers can apply to re-designate eligible experienced migrant workers as skilled foreign workers. For manufacturing employers, the 25% cap on skilled foreign workers as a proportion of the migrant worker quota will be removed, allowing skilled workers to fill 100% of the quota.
■ Expand access to skilled foreign labor for the hospitality and commercial port sectors: To expand the labor supply in these sectors, employers may directly recruit skilled foreign workers from overseas.
■ Enhance government efficiency: To improve direct recruitment processes through government-to-government channels and ensure fair hiring practices, the Ministry of Labor will establish new centers for recruiting transnational workers, including overseas branches. These centers will handle the hiring and skills testing of such workers, strengthening the hiring workflow.