Thank you to come back just in time for the second one this you know we really into a tree because today we have two fantastic quite quite different talks by Professor Lin and this particular lecture she's talking about Taiwan Manchukuo and the Sino-Japanese War I think that's why it's actually the topic so wide-ranging it attracting different people here okay maybe we should start and after an hour then we will have actually quite a dedicated time we said for Q&A okay and thanks for Lin Professor Lin again and should we give her another round of applause? series treaties let's go to the three beauties at the very beginning for the second talk this is the top beauty of Japan in the wartime period and top beauty of Beijing and top beauty of Manchukuo you see his clothes still carried the motif of the Qing Emperor imperial family the dragons and the yellow color okay so the top beauty of Manchukuo and this is a poster provided by Taiwan product promotion association for T exhibition so this is an exhibition to be held on it you see because someone recognizes this phrase have you seen this phrase this phrase is not the phrase of a Zhang Kai-shek government with the triangle yellow on the top this part is totally the same as the Zhang Kai-shek government's natural phrase but on top of it there's a triangle yellow bread saying anti communism and for peace and this is a bread of warmth Manchukuo okay of course this is Japan and so this is three breaths were tied up together and to promote Taiwan's green tea you see a couple of towers green tea and the sources of energy to prosper Asia okay the image of this poster reveals so much happiness for this group cooperation the cooperation among Taiwan and along the gyms area and Manchukuo area in Japan this is a so different from opposing feelings told in Japan because Manchukuo started from the Mokdan incident which dated September 18th 1931 after 1918 there's also 77 and the Montepolo bridge incident which made it to Japan in Spain to Beijing so these two figures had actually grew or sealed Chinese hatred against the Japan the Taiwan people had always been told about these two figures in the early post-war period but how could I obtain this poster because while I visited here as a professor say five years ago I visited here before on that trip I had been vigorously learned from the British Museum how to prepare for a museum exhibition because on that trip I had a responsibility to prepare for a museum exhibition in Taiwan for museum exhibition I had to have some contact with the artifact collectors this is one thing collected by one artifact collectors and that artifact collectors was actually a dentist has was actually a dentist some once I am I have a tooth problem I went to his clinic and this poster is right in his clinic and then right now he crosses the clinic this poster was in was shown in the kind of a coffee shop around the artifacts he collected and that coffee shop was located near to the Yong Kong Street of East Gate of Taipei okay so for this artifact collector this is really something interesting to him but this is so different from the entire Japanese feeling we have been told about the hatred against the Japan along the 918 and 777 okay so purpose of this talk is to depict the trade between Manchukuo and Taiwan for Manchukuo we don't need to give the base because it starts from 1932 and ends in 1945 so so it's actually the wartime period and from this trade I would like to draw some implications for post-war Taiwan and this is the purpose of this talk for writing this paper some different angles have been taken for the study of colonial empires for example British empires or German Empire or any other empires usually is the relations between the home colonizers and the other colonies just this bilateral relationship have been studied this study is a study on the relationship between colonies and together with the colonizer also it's a relative relationship with other countries okay so this is one different angle for in in the previous studies we have the professor professor of Kyoto University holy patrol and he mentioned that the in the 1930s the Great Depression started up from New York again of Wall Street also the same as this time actually affected very much for Japan's move back to East Asia because before the Great Depression Japan had a great intermediate cooperation with the US because of the economic downturn of US Japan come back to East Asia because of this turning back to East Asia Japan Titan up is a relation with its economies so again it's the bilateral relationship between the colonizer and the colonies for so so so but my mind is deeper somewhat different from holy puzzle and in depicting the trade between Taiwan and Manchukuo actually professor stop three just asked me to talk about this paper and this paper is in continuous of other people then other paper get more description about the exact trade in between and this paper is about invitations but without the formal paper maybe you cannot understand later part so I summarize the product of the formal paper here and in this a tree even though the Japanese merchants have been more dominant between Taiwan because Taiwan had been colonized by Japan and Manchukuo was have been popular regime of Japan so in between the treaty in between actually was a very much control or affected by Japan's government or Japan's merchants but for Taiwanese merchants it's still an expansion of the Taiwanese merchants trading opportunities so in this sense you could say Taiwanese people will kind of combing the imperial subjects right and in the previous literature we have so many studies about the Cominka movement now what's the difference between this study and the Cominka movement study in the Cominka movement study we just know that those Taiwanese spoke Japanese at home or they changed their last name from one character to two characters this is something proceeded within Taiwan okay and this study would touch some area beyond the Taiwan and this area would be would actually actually be related with sadness about February 28th so how come let's move a little bit forward every year in Taiwan since Li Dengwei's period on February 28th the president of OZ in Taiwan would apologize for the OZ government's massacre over the Taiwanese when it just arrived at Taiwan and thinking back to this tragedy because right now it's June we just had the last February 28th the mass media would be entangled with the issue about whether it is a jump high share or it's a general dispatch to Taiwan to take over Taiwan saying who should be responsible this is a key concern for February 28th issue the mass media would also regret that even compensations have been made towards the suffering families how come the excellent relation between the mainlanders and the Taiwanese cannot be smoothed for six decades for curing the disease we need to have better diagnosis of the symptom opposing memories of Japan for this two estimate groups in a sign of your principal periods has also actually been sources of this estimate congruence the trade between Taiwan and Manchukuo will tell some of the story so then let's move to the intermediate times filled in between after Manchukuo was set up after September 18th 1931 in 1932 the Manchukuo was established of course the difference between that time was the change Japan had for Manchukuo before Japan had already some influence over Manchukuo because of last talk in last talk we had the Japan's victory over Qing China in 1895 after that Japan had a victory over Russia in 1905 with that victory Japan already took over Dalian, Yushen and that means the very tip very southern tip of Manchuria that was taken by Japan in 1905 and Japan started to exert its influence for example to build a railway so to to have the banks to influence Manchuria or things like that but it's not until the September 18th that Japan have control over the whole Manchuria okay that's the change after this whole Manchuria had been controlled by Japan that Manchuria started to have a cross-relation trade relation with Taiwan in Qing period actually there are some some trade in between in Qing Taiwan already started to use the soybeans of Manchuria that's for agricultural fertilizer but the trade was not big just some small trade and between 1905 and 1931 or 1932 some trade had been proceeded but also not not big after the Manchukuo was established you can see this chart this dark line was for Taiwan Manchukuo trade it used to be lower than Taiwan South China trade this line is South China trade South China was the native place of the Taiwanese and Taiwanese most Taiwanese people come from Fujian or some of them come from Kent Guangdong so at the very beginning of Japanese colonial period Taiwan still had some trade more trade with the southern China but after the 1930s you see the trade between Taiwan and Manchukuo already should be stated that of Taiwan South China trade for the other line is Taiwan Central China trade or Taiwan Northern China trade or Taiwan Southeast Asian trade all those cannot compete with Taiwan Manchukuo trade after the 1930s for the other trees is not until the final final wartime period that when Japan had more control over this area and then they have a more trade with the Japan line and then with the Taiwan under Japanese rule so that's the reason why there's an increase of trade in the final in the later years so this is the situation of Taiwan Manchukuo trade for trade directly there must be some division of labor in between the division of labor constitutes a trade and what kind of division of labor to be made to be in between Manchukuo was in a very cold area cold area people tend to tend to need to eat meat meat eating people tend to need to drink tea okay and the Taiwan is a tea producing area that's why the three buildings was drinking tea and there okay Taiwan was a tea producing area and the cold area tend to be more lack of vegetables and fruits Taiwan within the tropical weather is very abundant with vegetables and fruits and on the other side from from from Manchuria a scientist Manchuria could provide you so many for being the fertilizer for the growing agricultural progress of Taiwan other than the nature fertilizer as a soybean after the establishment of Manchukuo Manchukuo started to have a chemical fertilizer all those are good for the rising agricultural development of a Japanese colonial Taiwan so this is the main good exchange in between and then about the what was the background for what to move this this trade trade usually is made by the invisible hand by the market force but this trade was not made by invisible hand instead is made by visible hand that means it's very much affected by the Japanese government or Japanese merchants because of the Great Depression we just mentioned the Japanese government tried to use Manchukuo to ease the the threat of Great Depression upon upon Japan's economy because with the Japan with the depression then then there was less chance for investment right or this employment that's for depression and then after taking Manchuria Japanese people started to invest a lot in Manchuria at that time in between 1931 to 32 of the two billion yen that Japan had invested in China 1.5 billion was invested in Manchuria you see and then among the investment there's the shipping companies was included so Osaka commercial shipping company reduces shipping fees 30 to 50% from the third of December 1931 for great shift from from Manchuria through the cities finally to Taiwan the navigation lines were expanded very much expanded this will external navigation lines of Taiwan around the 1911 to connect Taiwan with Japan plopper and around 1929 more lines between Taiwan and Japan plopper around 1928 between Taiwan and at that time Taiwan Chinese man and the relationship is not like the the Junkai ship here at Junkai ship here totally no trade because there's the embargo US in Margo in between but in the Japanese colonial period there's a still trade between the colonial Taiwan and the Chinese mainland and this is the navigation lines to link up both areas and but it's just up to oh it already up to the Italian and then after Manchuria you see Taiwan has been linked up with Korea and Manchuria much more with more navigation lines and all those navigation lines with other area of China was linked up with this newly developed Taiwan Manchuria Korean navigation lines not only more direct navigation lines was opened the shipping companies are also provided faster and bigger ships in this several decades so at the very beginning nine days will be needed to cover this distance in the end four days it just take four days to cover this distance in between and then because for for constituting this trade so many perishable agricultural products will be carried on the ships so on the ships or after ship there's a railroad of Manchuria upon the in the railway station or upon on the ships refugee region facilities were equipped for carrying on this trade okay uh-huh so around 1943 not the only ships or and and the railway but also airplane you could get use one ticket to move along Taiwan Japan Manchuria Korea or any other Japanese influence area with just one ticket it's called a transportation block okay now as a consequence as a consequence of this efforts the expansion of Taiwan trade with Manchuria Korea was was greater than that between Taiwan and Japan I'm saying the increasing rate and not a total of one total of one of course Taiwan Japan would be much greater than Taiwan Manchuria I'm saying the increasing rate in this period for Taiwan Manchuria is greater than Taiwan Japan's and then in in considering this trade the Japanese merchants of course keep the dominant position we can see uh for importing those fertilizers uh we who our data shows is the Mitsui, Mitsubishi, Taishu, Kogyo, Anbei, Nobu, and Kada, Kadangumi and all these Japanese companies to import the the fertilizer uh into Taiwan they also imported uh ammonium sulfate from Manchuria to Taiwan and for exporting Taiwan's agricultural products and to take a sugar for example in 1932 the sugar exported from Taiwan to Dalian was the product of Japanese firms major and show means sugar processing cooperation uh in 1932 the heat resistance was shifted to Manchuria from Ilan that in the northeastern part of Taiwan were products of Asano-Wuzan company so you could feel this is just well if you go to the paper we have much more evidence just this is just to give you a feeling that well Manchuria was established by Japan and Taiwan was a colony of Japan so the trading between was actually a Japan to Japan trade because in the Japanese colonial period the two companies were mostly owned by the Japanese private companies uh Taibatsu and on the Manchuria side the Taibatsu also had had influence there so it's a Taibatsu-Taibatsu relationship and then for those agricultural products market we could see previously the evidence is just for Taibatsu and we have evidence for the Japanese government's effort for example some Japanese uh Taizong that's a central Taiwan industrial development section went to Manchuria and Korea for one month visit when he returned he said that there was a market in Manchuria for Taiwanese products so the government side also tried to open so Taibatsu as well as the government and then they even opened set up the Taiwan five package at that time Taiwan had a five package sales in mediation office because in the process of a trade they will have some conflict so they set up a mediation office as well as a joint mediation office to increase cooperation between Manchuria and Taiwan or all within Taiwan and in the process of opening this trade network between Taiwan and Manchuria many Japanese merchants initiated promotion exhibition just like what the poster shows and they promote promotion they have a lot of promotion exhibition the Taipei Prefecture product exhibition which opened successfully in the Manchuria cities of Dalian, Fong Tian, today is Shenyang, Xinjin, today is Changchun and Haobing, displayed in 1935 the products including black tea, dried bamboo shoots and seafood of Taiwan so this kind of thing but when since both Taiwan have Japanese merchants and Manchuria have Japanese merchants then even this two sides have some competition what to do here we have a taste about the call a call situation you know in northern tip of Taiwan Jilong is a call producing area and some Japanese merchants cooperate with Taiwanese merchants have enterprises for a call supply and Manchuria is a call producing area as well there there's a famous call mines named Fusun, Fusun call mines you know that Fusun call mines even went there the far far from from Manchuria to southern Taiwan the cost is one fourth of the cost from northern Taiwan to south Taiwan because of that transportation facilities together with it might be in larger scale of economy of scale because it's a it's a bigger mines economy of scale so it's less expensive then buying the northern Taiwan's calls and the Japanese merchants and Taiwanese merchants in northern Taiwan petitioned to the Taiwan government and that petition had been awarded to the central government of Japan to say well if Taiwan's call comes from abroad after the domestic call enterprises had been beat down by the call and the Fusun call mines mine raised their price and this is what the Taiwanese merchants and Japanese merchants said but the Japanese emperor said well Fusun is still part of the Japanese empire for everything we should think within the framework of the empire not only part some specific part of the empire we should take the whole empire as the framework for any decision so the final decision is Taiwan was still importing the Fusun calls okay from 1932 to 1945 because the war tension was reinforced and reinforced so actually for every trade the trade for every product we could see the deeper and deeper governmental intervention for example for the banana trade at the very beginning the Japanese government had a kind of a laser fair policy for the Japanese merchants or Taiwanese merchants direct to open their market by themselves and award their products but more some organizations have been formed with a greater supervision of the government over various kinds of trades no matter tea orange sugar or vegetables more and more governmental intervention have been developed so with this kind of background still Taiwanese merchants traded for example even those bigger Japanese companies traded the fertilizer along with them we could still see in some Taiwanese merchants for example Jiananio from Taoyuan also traded in between for the for the like the business for for the organizations particularly in the wartime period for for the whole trade I will could see the grassroots elites of Taiwanese joined those organizations and those agricultural green uh local grassroots agricultural organizations was actually the very first uh local agricultural organizations for promoting trade in in the history of Taiwan and the local elites were still quite active in the in the production and distribution aspects for this trade even though on the Manchuria side the Japanese merchants would have more control because on the Manchuria side Taiwanese people were not that many there and a lot of Japanese there so on that side Japanese had more control but on the Taoyuan side Taiwanese merchants were still very active this kind of experience is kind of an international trade experience the situation of Manchuria is kind of a complicated it's a popular region of Japan but Japan says it's an independent state and so uh when uh going through this for for engaging the trade it has to still it still has to go through customs hmm uh you know the uh at the Darlin or particularly Darlin they have still have to go to they do the custom reports now then uh Manchuria was silver using monetary area and Taiwan was a gold using monetary area so for when when you go abroad you need to encounter the problem for for exchange the foreign currencies so this uh Chinese merchants also had to face the exchange issue for engaging in this trade this is kind of an international trade experience and and uh after the Japanese merchants initiated so many product exhibitions in Manchuria the Taiwanese merchants follow up and the Japanese governmental agencies went to understand the market then the Taiwanese merchants also had their own market survey afterwards so this all accumulations of international trade experiences um so um this is uh uh something which should have some legacy for possible Taiwan you know possible Taiwan uh even up to now it's a treaty dependency a dependency ratio was more than 100 percent how come 100 percent because uh that uh uh ratio was calculated by dividing export value plus import value over uh GNE uh gross national expenditure gross national expenditure has uh the uh the uh import minus export so and then plus uh governmental expenditure and the investment investment expenditure and consumption that's why it's possible to be over 100 percent so the loot for Taiwanese people is an international trade experience it's very important for understanding uh current Taiwan and in in this process of the um the enforcement of Taiwan Manchuria trade we could see the accumulation of Taiwanese merchants trade experience but then uh and uh for for for the kind of Taiwanese merchants these products are tea sugar uh oranges uh and bananas it's very gross loaded and from from the previous previous trade situation uh as as we have shown there's already trade between Taiwan and um Chinese mainland in the japanese colonial period those trade uh we have uh uh maritime reporter study um for the value of trade product exported to Manchuria through the custom houses of Ji Yong and Gao Xiong here's Gao Xiong hidden behind almost the same okay and that means no uh for for export because northern Taiwan had more oranges and tea and so so for export to Manchuria uh in the earlier session it mentioned uh north south divide uh for this north south was equal for exporting things uh to Manchuria but but uh for import the southern uh Gao Xiong is this line Ji Yong is this line that means southern Taiwan had more trade uh with uh Manchuria than northern Taiwan um at the same time uh we have actually all the charts i i i didn't have time to get it here but basically uh northern Taiwan's trade was uh before Manchuria northern Taiwan's trade uh with southern China was much more than southern Taiwan okay before Manchuria so it means after Manchuria it increased it increased more trading opportunities for southern Taiwan more gross looted Taiwan okay and and for for northern Taiwan's trade with China a lot of trade was uh um re-export trade of a japanese product uh to uh chinese mainland uh at that time uh we have to say China at that time uh chinese mainland is a republican channel you know uh so so uh then uh so you can see this uh this uh uh uh uh Manchuria Taiwan trade increased more uh opportunities for local merchants uh particularly uh from peasants uh to traders they went directly to to Manchuria to engage in they are not only on production side because they went there for exhibition or for marketing so they they have the experience for for uh engaging in trade uh on the uh the trading partners uh area um and then uh what's about the this the Taiwanese merchant's identity in some evidence we can see when uh uh japanese government tried to uh have Taiwan produced the particular kind of tea uh uh uh which would be liked by Manchuria consumers and it uh uh started to recruit people for this kind of a training to produce particular kind of a tea we could see in that recruitment the government says this kind of a training would only be open to people who could conduct a kokugo who could speak japanese okay uh then um then so so uh these uh traders had to be more uh linked up with uh uh japan and then then uh uh when this uh uh let me see when this trade will proceed we can see a lot of uh uh Taiwanese happiness was uh looted upon the mainlanders uh business because the Taiwan oranges uh replace uh Shanghai oranges because Manchuria people used to uh import oranges from Shanghai after Manchuria instead they used uh Taiwan's oranges and uh when Taiwan's tea was sold to Manchuria the Manchuria area no more used the Fujian Anhui tea or Hunan tea which they used to use okay and and and the the main harbor of Manchuria changed to be Dalian the Dalian replaced Inko in the Inko days the the poor people have invested a lot of money on the tea mountains in Fujian Anhui and Hunan this is a in a very heightened network commercial network then Dalian together with the Taiwanese merchants constituted another trade network to replace the trade network in this replacement of course the political situation in between uh changed things uh uh with the outbreak of uh uh the modern incidents the the trade between uh chinese uh interior area with Manchuria directly decreased and then the uh the tax rate the custom because then there's a cut Manchuria was used Manchuria used to be part of China with the establishment of Manchuria there's a customs in between and even though between Taiwan and Manchuria there's a still custom rate custom uh revenue to be levied but the the tax rate is much lower and then the then the rate between Chinese interior area and Manchuria okay and then so and and what happened to uh uh China uh with the loss of Manchuria according to one monetary historian Wang Yejian um China lost one third of its uh uh import revenue because of the loss of of of Manchuria which is which constituted a great economic straight to China in the depression period you must know all this was engaged in the in the desperate depression period of early 1930s and so so uh China side was worse and worse and the town side was better uh so and then with this kind of uh development at the very beginning the Taiwanese Manchuria was um hesitated to follow up the Japanese government or Japanese Manchuria but because Japanese uh Taiwanese products uh for example when Taiwanese products was sold to Southeast Asia it's labeled as uh Japanese products and then because of the Mark Dunn incident or Mark Polo Bridge incident the Southeast Asian overseas Chinese which show the key uh economic share of Southeast Asian uh economy they no more purchased Taiwanese products because it's Japanese and they turn to be anti-Japanese right because of Mark Dunn because of Mark Polo the overseas Chinese normal Japanese products so the Taiwanese merchants have to follow up uh the the the Japanese government or Japanese merchants should to extend their uh trade with Manchuria okay okay then uh with the Great China Great loss of other uh also the Southern China as we shown the Southern China's relation with Taiwan decline right both of the same as Southeast Asia because of uh Japanese event in in Beijing upon upon China then Taiwan lost more and more market in this area then Taiwanese had to make it up in Manchuria uh in the end uh for some tea more just sign the Mark Dunn incident and Mark Polo Bridge incident has actually holy wall whatever because the Manchuria market is much bigger than the lost market so um uh from from this study we could realize the during the Sino-Japanese war period uh Taiwanese basted interest was very much tied up with the Japanese empire which is a very much contradictory or uh taken advantage of the Chinese side so this is a story and then so um this part of uh history could you expect that the Taiwanese would speak up about this cooperative uh uh with the Japanese situation in the course of 1945 period they were not speak up about this right but they they have a failure they have been very much um intertwined with the Japanese side empire empire before 1945 and after 1945 the Republic of China's government they carried the the war experience against Japan so they just carried that memory historical memory with Japan to rule over Taiwan what what's the actual process of February 28th actually sometimes for many many cases just cross up to now for many situations because some couple speak to Japanese at home and the neighbors say they are between the government so they accuse that couple to the court and the judge of the court tend to be anti-Japanese so this constitute the trial and the sentence and the massacre right so ultimately without jantai shi without senyi this is still a very difficult problem for post-war Taiwan for the majority of the population with their best interest had been so much intertwined with the Japanese empire and for the minority people but they have been ruling over Taiwan and they had been so much invaded by Japan this so here I provide other routes for Taiwan's estimated congruence in the post-war period which is some problem that Taiwan still have to tackle today it doesn't end with February 28th 1947 with that saying it's still very much with Taiwan today it affects our perception about the or about a lot of other things so we could discuss all of this together or maybe I have been sitting here this morning for the geography textbook session and history textbook session answering all of them could be discussed together in the following period thank you it's also tying with tomorrow's topic the politics of identity so you know thank you so much for this fantastic talk and it and brings quite a lot of insight especially some area that we don't usually pay attention to so I think I don't think you want to have a rest or maybe we just carry on with the Q and A to you oh okay I think quite a lot of question already and Josh and you're one any yes and that is and Michael and that's me so maybe we take four first Josh yes please or just be up yes yes I'm asking you to to to ask question now I didn't raise my hand I'd like to say go for it oh go for it I'm so sorry and who's next of dubby yes okay a fascinating lecture I think it was really interesting to kind of reveal what kind of what was the history of of Taiwan I think that was I'm glad I kind of push you to talk about that topic but I think there was some interesting links between both your lectures and you really touched upon that right at the end this the root of the ethnic problems and how that ties in with the divergent positions on for example and also the very different perceptions of the question in China and Taiwan and a lot of this again is down to these kind of historical memories but the one question I wanted to ask specifically particularly on the second lecture was about the human relationships between Taiwanese and people in Manchuria what was the relationship like to what extent were Taiwanese merchants for example discriminated against by let's say Chinese nationals and it must have been an issue after 1945 they would they have been accused of being um collaborators for example it must have been even worse after 1949 yeah okay so yeah can I answer that question so this one yes yes it's on yes okay um thank you for Professor Duffy to have mentioned these two aspects actually it's covered in a paper but I just didn't have time to go through it for the Taiwanese situation in Manchuria is much more comfortable than in southern China because in southern China when they actually the Taiwanese merchants uh was was uh economic leaders in southern China but on the other hand they they uh well would be suspected yeah so so uh there's the so called what the rascals some Taiwanese merchants were called uh uh lang ren rascals in southern China and the when they they did uh open business uh they had to commit a crime but in Manchuria the Manchuria government encouraged the Taiwanese merchants to have the open complaints uh and in Manchuria they directly speak in Japanese uh in in in southern China or even in Shanghai Shanghai uh before the Shanghai incident uh they they spoke Chinese after the Shanghai incident they changed to speak Japanese so that's the situation of Taiwanese in different places of China and for Taiwanese in Manchuria after 1949 some of them were killed because of their deep cooperation with the Japanese government but some some returned to Taiwan because uh about uh one thousand people uh Taiwanese went to Manchuria uh they they had been an electric engineer uh because in Manchuria a lot of the electricity had been developed and they also uh went there as doctors and many of them returned to Taiwan to join the post-war Taiwan's uh development between those who could remember the Japanese in coming in 19 in 1895 and the younger generation who couldn't and it said of the younger while the older generation in the 50s and 60s were very anti-Japanese nevertheless the younger generation um knew where their future might lie and many actually hoped for Japanese victory in China after which they could go and be pro-consorts and intermediaries with their Japanese language Chinese and while at the same time knowing if they stayed in Taiwan they wouldn't get any jobs under the Japanese in Taiwan so there was this cultural split pointing to the fact that the younger generation was by no means so so anti-Japanese and as we know many certain Japanese yeah for the overseas uh Chinese and Southeast Asia or some of them were under the rule of the British government um there's a better generation gap uh we have some other scholars who work on this topic uh it has been perceived that the older generation were more anti-Japanese the younger generation were more cooperated with the Japanese and um for Southeast Asia as a whole um maybe it's a common knowledge for Southeast Asian studies scholars because of Japanese uh kicking off the the old colonizers including Britain uh the the Dutch uh India uh and then all the friends and actually they helped the Japanese helped the later independence of these countries so in the recent in the recent June 4th mass media I just watched BBC's Chinese page it says in Asia right now many it's PRC China or Korea tend to be more anti-Japanese for the other area they are not that much anti-Japanese Desmond Desmond first question is uh I would like to ask about the the previous section on the on the international law issue um so so if the if it according to the treatise is when Japan is uh used to turn funky uh uh renounce uh Taiwan Korea and so it seems to me that's the instance that that hasn't hasn't mentioned where where the sovereignty of of Korea and Taiwan will be so technically is it is it uh in that period before the ROC and and Japan signed any treaty in that the no international law guiding the the ROC uh recapture ROC captures of Taiwan and my second question uh I would like to ask so if uh Taiwan in turn independence and and how about the the the sovereignty of uh of uh the territory will it be affected or how of these international law can apply or will it be another story yeah for the renunciation of uh Taiwan and Korea in article two of San Francisco is on this is all okay uh in the San Francisco peace treaty actually for for Korea the article two also says uh uh Korea could gain independence all right so uh there's more for Korea in San Francisco peace treaty how about for for Taiwan actually uh the uh common uh common uh uh uh uh uh assertion about that funky would go together with well there's no object because neither uh ROC or PRC went to San Francisco so uh that that resulted in the unsettled uh position uh for Taiwan's status but actually uh that kind of assertion is only based upon article two if we go to article four and article 26 uh we will understand that um uh uh even though ROC was not in San Francisco there's some uh preparatory uh terms uh for for the latest signature uh of peace treaty between Japan and ROC in Taiwan in 1952 article four says uh for the um territories renounced in article two Japan accepts what the Japanese and what the US military government decided for those territories you know the the uh uh uh Chen Yi uh acceptance of Japanese uh final government general's surrender in Taipei was engaged under the order of Mark Arthur the order number one that's US military government's uh uh decision so Japan had to accept that that that order is uh the Republic of China to have accepted uh the surrender of of a Japanese um Japanese army and article 26 says for those countries who had a war with uh with Japan and uh without the chance to to have uh the to sign the peace treaty in San Francisco uh they are supposed to uh in case they are following the principle of the United Nations that principle is a peace loving principle that means that PRC does not satisfy this condition and and and also it used to be a UN founding countries uh that country uh is supposed to sign um the uh treaty with Japan with legal efficacy the same as the San Francisco peace treaty that the the the coming treaty was the treaty signed between uh Republic of China in Taiwan and and the Japan uh on on uh April 28th 1952 you know it's a seven and a half hours after that signature that the the US made San Francisco peace treaty turn effective without the turning effective of that peace treaty Japan would not have regained its sovereignty it would still be under the control of Mark Arthur so there's two packages or very much will tightly link with each other and that that's for the renouncing and then if Taiwan declared independence or or then what's the legal rights Taiwan could have for or anything else then it lose every right because on the treaty it says directly is the Republic of China and for someone who who will still say well in the type of treaty uh the sovereignty the the warden of sovereignty was not there but you have to read the the the uh uh uh legal uh words more carefully because article two of um type of treaty followed actually copied the article two of San Francisco treaty in that article it says uh Japan renounced every right claims or uh another term everything about the Taiwan uh japan renounced that everything we have to go back to the simonal psyche treaty that i just show you is a full sovereignty yeah of course uh japan's right again from simonal psyche treaty we have to go back to simonal psyche treaty that's full sovereignty Taiwan's full sovereignty other than that in article 10 of a type of treaty uh for for inhabitants upon uh Taiwan no matter what time they get into Taiwan they have to turn into the subjects of republic of china according to the law of republic of china okay then on the date on the day of turning into effect of the type of treaty that's august 5th 1952 japan started to set up its embassy japan's embassy to republic of china on on on uh uh the second section of uh Zhongshan north road uh near to what right now is a there's a huanan bank there you see you you see this term japan住中華民國大使館 uh the japanese embassy to uh to republic of china embassy you just had that capital in 19 embassy should be at the capital of a government so no problem about the capital issue in legally it has been solved in 1932 it's an ideological problem which keeps turning negging that uh republic of china's capital is still in 19 in reality it's already in the Taipei Da使館 okay this is the one seat uh 1922 august 5th uh and then and the embassy is a guest to any country right japan when polio taiwan was owned by by japan japan was the owner and this is this state this uh turning into effective date of a type of treaty was the date that uh uh japan turned from the owner of taiwan into the guest of taiwan of course the sovereignty had been shifted and for for the independent camp you give up everything about this uh based upon all these laws and uh the this law had been actually is a law of uh of republic of china if i i'm going to be the president of republic of china someday i will put all these people into jail how come all this all this this great huge population of taiwanese don't follow this law you know treaty is different from declaration because it has to go back to your home country to be ratified that ratification process is the same as your lawmaking process according to the constitution of republic of china it has to go through executive union and legislative union and the president and is the president to proclaim uh this law and this treaty has been proclaimed by jen kai shea on august 9th so this is a domestic law for republic of china today and then it has been registered because the un charters say for any treaty so sign among countries if you don't register at the union the union would not recognize it so this treaty is is recorded in that uh uh jen kai shea pro proclamation on august 9th this treaty had registered at un and when we look at the un's website it is easily to be located when we go to un website this uh treaty had been registered as number 1858 of the 1952 treaties of un so if you change your your name you just change everything you just lose everything and what about um everyone in the world call call you as taiwan how come you still stick with oc okay and then uh un un say well you could change your name if you are the member of un you can certainly change your national name so only after you get uh get back to un you could make this action okay we got the doctor kim yeah that's why i came from i'd like to ask a question regarding current japanese perception of the i read japanese media explained today it's not very explained at all uh current japanese media uh the discourse there is the assertive prc is encroaching upon uh japan's proper sovereign area of senkaku island and have you made any effort to or taiwanese media effort to change public knowledge and perception within japan over this issue with the grounds historical legal ground you spent out today and another question related question is uh in history we know that uh japanese public had been sometimes uh had difficulty in getting the right uh information like after matured we have incident the japanese public believed that it was really provoked by chinese and japan was certainly acting on because of self-defense what do you think about the current perception in japan over this issue although it would be ideal i would say that if you have another japanese present about this issue thank you okay thank you um actually had been uh in japan twice uh to have uh uh speak of uh the doritai uh understanding of me uh there um um for the paper writer uh in the first time uh it has been rendered into english so if you go to japan focus as the asia pacific journal uh english journal uh is a e-journal uh but under with my name uh if you google mind holding and japan focus uh it comes up my my paper rendered into english for the first uh conference paper presentation uh the conference was actually held sponsored by both the diplomatic officer of our seaside and the japan side and on that visitor also went to the japan congress uh to forward my message to to two congressmen um that's for the first first visit uh second visit a second paper presentation was in tokyo university and that conference was held by tokyo university with uh many other uh universities in japan and this field is not only i have to be busy with this ppt for these two talks i have to be busy with um the the paper publication uh in iwanami shoten uh that the conference organizer is going to publish the uh proceedings at iwanami shoten so um i would think this is really something uh uh uh uh to to be solved among east asian countries because east asian countries have a lot of other aspects to be cooperated uh we cannot interfere those uh cooperation possibilities with this minor thing this is in for me optina is a very minor even even the tension in between right now is so big so i i do think um um because i have a long-term friendship with japanese academic uh word i i do think uh japan would could be persuaded can i ask some question um one is about the second lecture you you talk about specifically on the trade between uh taiwan and manjohuo and i was just wondering why focus on menchuria uh not among all these colonies which means uh how about taiwan's trade with uh korea there must be a significance there that you chose this to present to us can you also explain a little bit about uh for example japanese uh sorry taiwan's trade with the southeast asia of the japanese rule during that period before answering your question it reminds me that i have to answer the second question of this japanese scholar about the background for mcdonald incident uh for the back uh the the uh because i'm basically an economic historian so my friends uh uh would refer to that great depression uh for the background uh so this is some uh not only this friend but also other japanese friend or would refer to the japanese to the great depression for the ultimate reason for the mcdonald incident and then okay uh for your question actually i have been very much influenced by your big china map i grew up in taiwan okay and then uh when i studied at harbour uh between my stay at harbour uh is then between uh 1980 to 83 and then from 88 to 89 my years there had been very much uh first academically okay but um emotionally very bad because i feel that it's such a valuable opportunity to study abroad and uh i 1980 is right after 1979 when uh i also see and uh you as a civil the diplomatic relationship i also think taiwan has been so poor and so our people out of the country should be more cooperative how come these two group of people uh have always been fighting with each other i think you must have this kind of experience right now no no no um people have to be divided but what they are they are saying when when they make their assertion history will be related before that uh i had already published some book about taiwan history so i have a feeling that the both camps have been talking something wrong for history so uh after harbour's work harbour's work are mostly on chinese history because i started from taiwan history and then moved to chinese history after harbour i moved back to to taiwan history because my my first taiwan history book is about trade so i continue to work on trade because every scholar has to be very careful to to to keep at a very firm stand and to keep the the iron bolt right iron bolt here so so iron rice bowl okay then then i stick with the trade then i have already worked on leeching trade already then i have to continue to the japanese colonial period and for dealing with this this cross china taiwan's trade issue i started up from taiwan's trade with chinese mainland in the japanese colonial period and um in this study the trade with manchuria was so vivid so then i i i extended to work on this taiwan uh my my zhoguo trade this is the background the research was made in 1995 it's it's the only reason that i rendered it into english um so the original research was made in 1995 then then it's it's eddy uh uh outcome upon the outcome research outcome of this taiwan manchuria i started to write newspaper articles and before that i always write very long very lengthy academic papers but uh from then on what i think i should speak up you know the the first article i published is what there's a little place not wrong to say that he was japanese before he was uh 22 years old i remember on that date um our history association in taiwan of a republic of china had some annual gathering they they were so surprised how come and he started over republic of china i could say they were the president uh uh used to be a japanese so much criticism started to really upon us upon me but it's okay i i have survived you can also elaborate a little bit about what what david was saying because i was thinking maybe uh although it's true that those long人 maybe uh will be they are gangsters or something but i mean those people who did business are they really powerful and how the proportion of them are they really controlling the taiwan trade to manchuria or actually still controlled by the japanese oh yeah let me ask a related just yes yes follow up i mean um one of the things that my mind was what about uh people from uh manchur or in taiwan because there must have been um manchur or traitors in taiwan but but but my people covered that area as well ah okay yeah let me answer some of your questions if not we can make it up um for your previous questions about the the other colonies of japan actually i have extended because uh uh why i started from taiwan chinese manan it's because your big china map that that i have grew up with so i firstly started with taiwan uh china trade and then extended to manchuria um because manchuria used to be part of china then my information because those japanese materials were sure and that time taiwan was not only trading with uh chinese manan uh taiwan was trade traded with korea with southeast asia with hong kong so i extended uh one by one uh up to now i have every every area covered because i'm in my research i also found that uh taiwan's trading partner is different from japan's japan's trading partner covered brosie or a lot of uh south america is is worldwide taiwan's trading partner just covered the asian mostly a great east asian area so i just covered the great east asian area for my taiwanese merchants trading studies and for for the role of taiwanese in all the trade the japanese merchants all government still as we analyze it particularly now in that period actually the government share cannot compete with our oz government's share in in wartime china because i have some statistics to show that most of the trade were made by japanese merchants particularly the zai bazi and that's a zai bazi period and the taiwan government general uh government what's the english for taiwan zong du taiwan general government general government general and uh just show a small percentage in the whole trade oh yeah yeah so it's the zai bazi to be more influential and for for those taiwanese the big merchants could serve as the the chairman of the chamber of commerce in shaman and therefore the big infrastructure in in southern china the taiwanese capital went there by using japanese know-how for example they they have the osaka railway technicians to help them to invest in san suato's railway this kind of a pattern had been there and for rascals of course some rascals were there and they turned and they had been whiten up because they earn money and whiten up into big merchants particularly in that time you know at that time if you're seeing those photos those rascals could be very much a dress up in those years in the photos i just wonder because you mentioned about the the trades were much more under control of the japanese government in menturia but why such a difference between you know the the trade oh yeah yeah for the shipping lines that i described and mostly they are called command navigation lines it's a commanded by the japanese government for the shipping lines between taiwan and japan proper not necessarily to be command navigation lines so this trade as i summarized is made by visible hand rather than by invisible hand and because of the war purpose right and george yes yeah oh finally yeah um i'd like to ask the question about trade but in terms of the future well the president looking for the future do you feel like currently taiwan or the taiwanese government is too focused on trading with mainland china and should taiwan be looking to other emerging markets like india or brazil or other nations or is it pursuing the right kind of strategy at the moment um actually i have one book about taiwan's legal status or in other way you could also google uh mind holding uh japan focus and there are two articles there up to now the second article article is about dao itai as i mentioned the first article is about lukewarm taiwan on the east asian seas and lukewarm as i have shown is very near to taiwan but taiwan almost forgot that place uh used to have a kingdom new q kingdom uh that kingdom existed when taiwan just had the uh scattered tribes of the aborigines because the golden age of that kingdom extends from 14th century to 17th century and those islands were mostly rocky islands rocky uh very rocky um so coral coral made of corals so it cannot compete with with taiwan for natural resources how come it appeared one kingdom while taiwan just had the tribes because new q used to play the role of asia pacific center for for east asian seas in that uh 300 years and later it lost this kind of uh uh antipode position so uh um it prepared the decline and the disappearance of that kingdom so i would say actually i i would like to attend your yesterday's uh discussion because of the disability preparation i dare not come actually i have a lot of words about about the about the the the students movement um actually uh taiwan do need to trade of course and the no more trade of the better and not only the china trade but how come every country in the world could trade with china how come uh republic of china we are brothers how come we cannot trade with them because taiwan up to now still don't know their legal status the ultimate reason is this up to now uh the whole population has not been taught about this treatise as i say it's a law of your country but you don't know about that law this is a very keen problem for taiwan if you do not handle well you might be some forgotten kingdom in some future days it will be the forgotten republic of china in taiwan um so uh taiwan really has has to be on its right track yes please okay good good and uh we have seen you mentioned that it could be very dangerous and we have seen some very remarkable inside they are actually talking about maybe the means in nari against things world war two and world war two and uh obama also has this new south asian strategy and uh china side they are declaring some kind of air defense zone so um with your understanding of taiwan with japan can you um and also of course really on the chinese side do you foresee at something actually not just an escalation of posturing and that um live service and but actual war may break out at some point up to now i'm i'm only a scholar you know uh in my application to the nation science foundation of of republic of china for this study it had been rejected so all this research had been done by my own uh sense of obligation as an intellectual of this this time period so so uh it's difficult but uh i think um it all those materials and international laws really make sense uh when when when i um personally presented my paper in japan's uh it's called the asia pacific forum uh the uh discussion comes from minzui company um it says well um this also argument had a lot of um um uh it's a substantially uh the argument had had been substantially made and then uh japan really have a much more uh things to take away uh to to to uh go ahead japan really need to go ahead uh without being stumbled stumbled by this issue so i do think that kind of aspiration uh is is very much uh in in people in east asia and the prc people were there and they were happy with this kind of a document argument as well because both side right now is this side says this is this and this side says this is this now i i open some other alternative this is a roc rather than prc or japan's okay well on that note thank you so much it's really fantastic and really fascinating topics and we will have 10 minutes of break but however let's have another round of applause and thank you very much


Good afternoon. Good morning. Thanks for joining us here at town meeting TV I'm so happy to be here with Stephanie you who is the new executive director at public assets Institute Thanks for joining us. Thanks for having me the last time that we talked you were We were conversing about in your role as a researcher and basically one of the leads on the reports The public assets puts out that informs your legislative agenda and hopefully creates more equitable Vermont Yep, I think I summed that up, right? I was pretty good. Yeah, but now you're the executive director and you have followed the longtime founder Paul Silo and congratulations. Thank you. Thank you and technically starts January 1st, but I'll take it Yeah, okay good on tents and purposes. Yeah, and why were you excited to take up this role as ED? It's a big job. There's no question. That's a big job But you know, I've been with public assets for seven years now and it's it's really rewarding work I mean, we're really thinking about as you said how to make a more equitable equitable Vermont I've got lots of ideas And it's been really great to have been working with Paul for seven years and really have a sense of where we're going and Our board and staff are amazing. We have a great team. Sometimes it's hard work But I'm excited about different directions. We can take it and also to sort of keep our core work going And why don't you just recap the core work so folks? Yeah, so a lot of what we we work on is state budget related stuff So that includes for a state level policy about family economic security in particular. So wage laws also benefit You know benefit programs that kind of thing But then we also do a lot of work on education funding, which is a big part You know, it's the biggest job that the state does. So that's a big piece of it, too Yeah, so those are kind of our big areas, you know, and then other public policy issues as they come up It you know, it can vary from year to year some years last year was a big year for education funding Sometimes, you know, we've been involved in the family leave conversation minimum wage Can be a range and so you've recently or about to publish your state of working Vermont. Is that the right title? Yep I think it came out. Yeah, and they came out this week. So tell us what the key findings are So really what we wanted to look at in this report was to think about What the pre-pandemic baseline was what worked in terms of government interventions during the pandemic and then where we are now And so really what we're what we're looking at is this is that? Going back to the pre-pandemic normal isn't a great idea because there were a lot of people struggling to get by then Some of our government interventions worked really well We saw them work housing cash in people's pockets food aid all of that stuff really worked well And then we kind of pulled the rug out. So, you know How do we keep some of those programs going or restart them as the case may be for some of these things and really? Making sure that we have a state where everybody can thrive and really thinking about what we what we owe to each other collectively What what does it look like to make sure that everybody has what they need? Which I think was really kind of the the spirit that the pandemic awakened So one of the things that I've noticed is an increase in wages across the state Does your report see that or is that just anecdotal? No, there's definitely up been some some increases in wages as you know inflation has sort of eroded some of those Actual increases some of the real spending power there, but part of it's sort of a journey across the pandemic You know in the first year so many low-wage jobs got shut down That that sort of appeared like a wage increase, but wasn't really real and then in 2021 It looks like there's definitely competition for workers. So we've definitely seen wages grow up go up in a real way But again with inflation where it is how much whether people are better off in terms of spending hours sort of Depends on the job depends on the sector depends on your situation And then what about the great resignation this Discussion about where are all the workers? This is a great question. It's not one that we can really answer definitively I think we can say that there's a couple of factors going on So the first thing to know is that labor force participation So the share of working-age people that are in the labor force either employed or looking for work Is that it's lowest level in more than 40 years as long as we've been keeping track pretty much So and that cuts differently across age groups that cuts differently differently across education But it's but overall it's at its lowest level in four decades. So The question is where are all those people is it that wages have gone up enough that people are able to take That people who maybe had a second job aren't taking, you know only have one job now Or is it we know that there's a section of people who retired early who maybe it's not ideal financially But you know whether it's health considerations spouses health considerations, whatever it is We saw a lot of older people leaving the workforce You know a lot of sort of early retirements and so that's definitely a slice of it There's definitely lower participation among, you know the 16 to 24 25 year olds Which is which had been declining before the pandemic, but definitely has gotten worse So whether those are people who were working while they were in school or doing multiple things Or whether it was people who? You know are able to live at home a little longer or whatever the situation might be There's a lot of moving parts and there's not one We don't have one neat story yet, but I think it's all of these things sort of put together Well, I remember in 2008 a lot of people that were going to retire didn't And i'm not sure they held on for 12 years, but they may have I mean, right. I remember at least in the nonprofit sector. There is this real concern about a cliff And in 08 the cliff didn't happen, but I see it happening now among my peers for example No, we're definitely seeing you know among Vermont or 65 and older that there's been sort of a pretty big drop in labor force participation Don't know whether that's permanent certainly could be You know and it certainly could be health considerations as well So and I think that again the government interventions the fact that there was some Some cash in people's pocket may have made it a little easier at least in the beginning to to sort of bridge You know if you were a year or two out from retirement now, you've got A little bit of a bridge. Maybe you step it up a little bit Well, I know that child care has been a is a big issue in the state big issue in the policy agenda And that there were subsidies for child care for people during the pandemic and that has been withdrawn largely What are the implications of that shift? So part of what we're noting in the report is that there's a pretty substantial reduction in the number of providers And also a reduction in slots and in some areas of the state pretty big reductions in slots You know 30 40 percent of child care, you know slots in child care capacity going down some of that is Is school programs some after school programs not being able to find staff or or They're being less demand because For whatever reason, you know parents keeping kids home more parents not wanting kids in multiple sort of Exposed in multiple settings Um, so we're not quite sure but I think you know I think there's there's been a pretty good road map in vermont and some thinking about How to shore up the child care sector and and thinking about it also as early education, right? Not just not sort of just child care But what does pre-k look like how much of this is education and really thinking about it as more of a collective Responsibility rather than a user fee for parents, you know that the parents are paying for it And we know that a lot of child care providers are underpaid So that has also likely contributed to people leaving the jobs when there if there's a better paying job somewhere else You know, it's tough to hold on to people. So I think there's a lot of thinking about Good wages. What's the right mix? You know, what is how does education play a role in all of it? And you know, what is the right capacity in terms of what people need? So the governor recently came out with a parental leave proposal if I'm not mistaken family leave actually family leave proposal Um, and he had vetoed. I think the last Yep proposal And now he has this new one, which is Structured differently. Could you comment on what the governor's proposing in your view of whether it's the right way to go? I haven't dug into the details of this particular proposal Yet, but I will say that my understanding of it is that it's pretty similar to where the governor was a couple years ago Which was sort of a private version of this and a voluntary version of this and what the the family Leave coalition and the partners that we've worked with on this have been pretty Pretty clear that it needs to be open to everyone and that it needs to be, you know, a collective contribution So not this voluntary sort of privatized version But the way that what makes it work is having a lot of people involved in it Sort of like any kind of big pooled situation, you know, that's what makes the cost structure work at an affordable rate And it's pretty clear. I think that vermonters are in favor of a big family leave And I think the pandemic really underscored the importance of having some flexibility and in in work time and So, you know, we'll see So really the question is how do you finance it? Is it a kind of like an insurance pool? I mean, that's in effect with the original proposals that the legislature were right a public insurance version, right? Right, but even that proposal if I remember correctly, and I'm sorry. I'm not being concrete, but Um really didn't go far enough in meeting the needs that families have in terms of subsidizing their time away from the office Is that right? Well, I will say that so as I said, there's a family sort of a coalition that's been working on this for a number of years that we've been involved with and And their position had and I don't know sort of I don't know when the last kind of regrouping on this was But I think, you know, it always started from a from a more robust place And then the legislature sort of looking at the cost kind of Negotiated it down to you know, whether it was 12 weeks to six weeks whether, you know There was some discussion of which family members count which I think great The good news is I think we've backed off a little bit from that discussion because it really should be Up to the people who their family members are that they want to take care of But um, but you know and then how much is the wage replacement? You know how far up does that go? What's the and we'd like to see a really robust system in some states have a really robust system? I think you know Yes, six weeks is better than nothing But really we're talking about you know 12 weeks is is really the kind of a starting place of what makes sense Because you know, whether it's parental leave or whether it's at some other long-term illness, you know Six weeks goes by pretty fast. So I think you know, I think that is part of the conversation is really this disbalance between cost benefit and You know what makes sense, but it is very cost effective to do it as this group pool So whether you go, you know, so 12 weeks, I think is a pretty good starting place And we'd certainly like to see you know more we know plenty of countries where it's a year of parental leave or six months at least so you know 12 weeks is I think a pretty reasonable starting place. So what would happen in the legislature this by any and the Governor's got a proposal. I imagine then does the legislature bring their proposal back How does the house policy get made now, right? Well everything sort of resets in a new biennium So it's not going to be the same bill But you know a lot of sort of the same the same concepts will be there and and over the years There have been several different versions that have passed one or the other house So, you know, we'll we'll just see where they go There's definitely been some noise that I think the legislature is pretty committed legislative leadership pretty committed to A robust family leave package. So, you know, we'll we'll sort of see what the process looks like, but you know, I think We've got a pretty good Groundwork lead for it and then tell us how public assets research and analysis Gets turned into legislation. What's the session look like for you? And what are the priorities and how do you advance them? I appreciate that question. So, you know, it really depends. So this year, there's a couple different pieces that we're working on Um, one of the biggest pieces is talking about the EITC and the the earned income tax credit and the child tax credit So I don't know how well publicized it was but Vermont passed the child tax credit in last session And that's huge not that many states have them. It's a big, you know, it's a thousand dollars for Kids under six, um, you know up to a parent income of a, you know, certain level or guardian income of a certain level But but you know, it could certainly be bigger We want to make sure that it gets expanded to as many people It could be both bigger dollar wise and who's eligible could be expanded one of the areas that we're looking at is Making sure that all families are eligible for that credit. We'd also like to see the earned income tax credit go up I mean, again, we raised it the legislature raised it in this last session Um, but there's plenty of room to still grow there So that's so that's up there and also those are there's sort of an eligibility, you know Who qualifies and who doesn't is part of the conversation not just the the amount of it So those two pieces, um, again, that's what we saw work during the pandemic The federal child tax cut it was huge for putting money in people's pockets and we saw positive effects not just for those families, but you know across the economy more broadly And just really a great direct way to make sure people have what they need and to kind of, you know, keep our economy going So so I so that's one piece. We're also working with some partners on some some budget process stuff I mean, it's a little bit boring But um, but a lot of it is really centering the conversation around what Vermonters need And I think unfortunately what happens in our budget process a lot of the time is that We're kind of looking at or I'll say the legislature and administration are sort of looking at How much money is coming in and then deciding what they can do And there really hasn't been a balanced conversation about are we meeting the needs? It's really like these are these are all the needs we can afford to meet because this is how much money we have As opposed to a real conversation about do we need more revenue? Do we need different revenue in order to meet these needs because these needs are really important? And so, you know, one of the things that we found in our report was that these these pandemic Interventions You know, it was pretty straightforward put money in people's pockets reduced poverty. It works pretty well so You know, are we committed to keep to continuing to do that? So I think that's So that's another piece where we want to at least make sure that we're having that conversation and actively making those choices As opposed to starting from this place of We're not raising revenue and we're never going to talk about, you know, what the needs of Vermonters are You know, and you know, to you know, I want to be fair the legislature obviously spends a lot of time thinking and talking about the needs of Vermonters But they're always thinking about how to stay under that cap too. And so I think that's part of the challenge Um, and I really think, you know, we saw so much Community coming together, you know, so much mutual aid So, you know, sort of the spirit of collective, you know, meaning each other's collective needs together During the pandemic that I think there's a real space to keep that going So are you Concerned about the impact of the government printing massive amounts of money in order to pay for covid Subsidies and its impact on inflation. I mean, is there a connection between all of that? And on the one hand The covid subsidies put money in the pockets of people, but on the other hand the implications the inflationary pressures Um, also are not favorable for people So how does that economic cycle work and how do you justify spending more? And offset the downsides of creating more money So there's a lot going on with inflation and there's a lot of factors and of course, you know When when you see the price of gas go up when you see the price of food go up It has real immediate implications for people, especially if wages aren't growing fast enough But the the short answer is no, I'm not particularly worried about the government doing too much I would rather the government do too much and then we figure out the other piece and a lot of the inflationary pressures Are really out of outside Vermont's control when we looked at the main causes of inflation This also shows up in our report. It's really energy prices energy prices is the biggest jump. So home heating You know fuels as well as gas prices and those are really things that are happening across the country It's not particularly across the world really Worn Ukraine lots of other factors that are that are affecting that that we don't have a lot of control over So I would rather make sure that people have the money that they need and then we figure out what else we can do on these other things And and so that's not something that we're overly concerned about I think that again, there's a lot of factors that are influence influencing inflation Some of which, you know, the federal government is trying to do some things about Some of which are out of our control and we're weathering You know again with gas prices, there's been some federal intervention to kind of manage that but Um, but the main thing is making sure that people have what they need And are you uh, what's your view the governor? Talks a lot about the number of people that that pay taxes versus the number of people that consume services and that He's concerned that there are fewer and fewer people who are contributing to the tax pool and more and more people who are consuming Subsidies if you will that are paid for by those taxes What's do you understand what i'm saying? He has this formula and We're losing two of those people every day So what's your view on his analysis and how that is structured? I think it's a wrong question I think that I think that what we should the question we should be asked is Why do these people have enough to pay taxes and these people don't have enough to pay taxes in the first place? So I think that's the question We've certainly seen income inequality on the rise concentrated in the hands and and again The pandemic was a very we hope a very unusual situation and it also highlighted cracks in the system that already existed Right, so so we knew we had poverty before we knew that wages weren't keeping up with inflation We knew housing housing prices were unaffordable for a lot of people in the state So You know, but why is that the case? Is it wage policy? Is it, you know, it's a combination of all these things Is this wage policy? Is it historical inequities that? Value some jobs that you know lower than less less money than other jobs So I think there's a lot of factors in there So I think it's not about how many people do we have paying taxes And and and that's really sets up this us them dynamic, which just isn't accurate I think it's because at any given time people can use services You lose your job during the pandemic again a lot of people lost their jobs And had no control over it, you know, that was the biggest unemployment spike we've ever seen So So people are going to need services people needed help with food aid people needed help staying at housing And it's not an it's not a sort of giver taker split. It's that What does everybody need? What does everybody need collectively and in the moments in your life when You lose income for whatever reason or you have certain circumstances or there's ongoing systemic challenges like We devalue service jobs and care jobs Because of historic sex sexism and racism, you know, what do we do about that? So I think there's a lot of ways to really think about this as What is the collective sort of contract we should have with each other and how do we meet that? And not about who's paying what and who's not paying what? So the legislature is a pretty much a brand new Wave of people primarily democratic maybe you know Veto proof majorities in there interesting. So how do you see How do you see your agenda in light of the the new set of legislators and now you're really the lead lobbyist for public assets? You have an expanded role So when you look at this session and you look at this next group of people that you need to build relationships with What are you thinking? I think it's a great opportunity I mean I think I think and you know the whole veto proof magic number Various permission to issue but this is certainly a legislature that's interested I think in getting things done and and is certainly more progressive than legislatures that we've seen And we have this administration who has sort of stifled a lot of these conversations over the last six years So I think there's a lot of potential for these the conversations to shift You know, I have been doing a lot of the work for public assets for the last few years So it's not totally new and also I'll say that our main job is not lobbying Our main job tends to be trying to Put good data into the conversation trying to frame conversations in a way that is fact-based And but also, you know, our vision is a state that works for everyone So we're also working toward that and sort of those are our recommendations So, you know, I think it is more of the same. I think it's a great opportunity In terms of this legislature. I think there's a lot of creative energy and sort of interest in kind of Doing some big things. So I'm excited to see to see what happens and to, you know, hopefully help shape that And are there any any legislation besides what we've talked about that we want to be tracking That you're you're helping legislators make happen and would be worth tracking So some of the things, you know, we mentioned is if if we there's some work on EITC if there's Some work on budget process stuff You know, I think it's still sort of we're still sort of in that phase of trying to see what what issues are going to come up I do think family family leave is going to be a big one Although I'll say, you know, there are other organizations that are more of the lead on that that Really know what they're doing So, you know, I I don't know that there's anything particularly that I would point to We're always paying attention to the state budget and what's going on there And some of that has to do with, you know, as the federal covid money Sort of gets narrower in terms of where it is in the budget and what what we can do with it I think, you know, we're talking about Is there going to be a cliff and what do we do about that cliff and those pieces Education funding there's still some conversations going on with that You know, there's been a lot of changes made that haven't been fully implemented In terms of education funding that people weighed last year and even the specialized funding of a few years ago There's still pieces being implemented So I think we're still keeping an eye on any future changes with education funding too All right. Well, there's a lot ahead And congratulations and I just want to thank you because We um think really highly of public assets and the work that paul has done over these years and the Not just paul obviously, but the staff and the board and it's just great to see you being the leader Thank you. So thank you. Yeah, I appreciate it. So we've been speaking with Stephanie. You she's the executive Director to be on january. Well, when you're watching this program january 2023 public assets institute And uh, we're looking forward to the work that you'll be doing to support the legislature this year. Thank you Thanks a lot. Thanks for watching


As part of effort to address the humanitarian situation in Benio State, Governor Samuel Autumn has launched the State Humanitarian Response Plan. The plan is a document that will provide a guide to all humanitarian workers in the state and deliver services to concerned people and communities who may be affected by crisis. Governor Autumn believes the plan will go a long way in responding to the more than 1.5 million internally displaced persons in the state. He appealed to the workers to help push the response plan to international communities for support. In 2015 when I was coming in as governor, that would be where we are today, I will tell you, it was not possible. But it is not just possible, we are where we are today. It is an unfortunate development. And I feel very sad as one of the leaders in this country that we have completely failed the people that water us. There is no basis to be where we are today if patriotic steps and proactive steps were taken to reverse the trend. The chairman of the Staring and Technical Committee, Professor Madeline Dura, who called for more resources to address the humanitarian situations in Benio, called on the federal government to give more attention to Benio IDPs whose children are out of school. The Benio State's Humanitarian Response Plan is a practical demonstration of the commitment of the state government and its partners to a full-fledged response to a humanitarian crisis in the state.  In addition to this, we have also had flooding, natural disasters and even communal conflicts. The Staring and Technical Committee, the Staring and Technical Committee, called on the federal government to use updates.