青年勞動九五聯盟 Youth Labor Union 95

"Youth Labor 95 Union" is an independent NGO aiming at promoting labor right in Taiwan. Its members consist of young social activists, university students and scholars.

The organization has four main goals:

1. To improve the working condition and developmental opportunities of young, unskilled, marginal laborers in Taiwan.

2. To strengthen the legal as well as actual labor protection for part-time workers.

3. To encourage young laborers to unite and fight for their own rights through higher participation in public affairs.

4. To promote awareness of labor right in the civil society.

Following McDonald's policy, multinational enterprises and chained convenient stores have created hundreds of millions of part-time, low-paid jobs in Taiwan. Young students and middle-aged women newly returning to labor markets are the biggest part of employees.

As has happened in other countries, employees in these enterprises are given unreasonably low wage by hour. Cases of questionable wage calculation and unfair working protection are often heard as well. Therefore, Youth Labor 95 Coalition has been demanding enterprises to raise their wage through protests and public education. Viewing their large scale and social visibility, the organization believes that transnational enterprises should improve the working condition of part-time employees so as to create a better model of management.

In order to arouse social awareness, members of the organization have held forums in high school campus and on shopping streets so as to explain this issue to youngsters. Moreover, continuous protests against McDonald and other enterprises are a crucial part of the organization's activities.

In the future, the organization's key goal is to push part-time workers to unite and make voice for their labor rights. For a long time, such an issue has been neglected by society as well as trade unions in Taiwan, thus it will be our first and foremost task in the coming years.