The “Married Daughters and Uxorilocal Sons” Clause in Taiwan Public Assistance Systems

In the following section, this article will discuss whether the “married daughters and uxorilocal sons”

clause in the Public Assistance Act violates the principle of gender equality from a micro perspective.

3.1 Gender Neutralization Amendments to the “Married Daughters and Uxorilocal Sons” Clause in the Public Assistance Act

When the Public Assistance Act was first enacted in 1980, its content was fairly simple and crude. It was not until the first total amendment of the act, in 1997, that it began to list (in Article 5) the number of members living in the applicant’s household that should be calculated during the means test for public assistance. The article is as below:

Public Assistance Act, Article 5 (1997)

To calculate the total family income referred to in Article 4, the following members living in the household should be included:

1. First-degree lineal blood relatives. Married daughters and uxorilocal sons with proof of no income can be excluded from the calculation.

2. Collateral blood relatives and other relatives with responsibility of maintenance who live in the same dwelling or who are registered in the same household.

The statement that “married daughters and uxorilocal sons with proof of no income” can be excluded from the calculation was obviously derived from the idea that married daughters and uxorilocal sons are “outsiders.”

They are believed to be economically distant from their parents, and, thus, the law does not expect unmarried daughters to fulfill the responsibility of maintenance once they are proved incapable of providing it.

Consequently, they are removed from the portion of the family that should be calculated in the means test. By contrast, the applicant’s son is included in the means test as a member of the household regardless of his marital status and maintenance ability. The son’s income—actual income if he’s employed and invented income if not—will be calculated toward the total income of the household.

In 2005, the Legislative Yuan once again amended the Public Assistance Act. Based on the principle of gender equality, the “married daughters and uxorilocal sons” clause in Article 5 was removed. Thereafter, the

children of the applicant were listed as members of the household and hence the subjects of means testing, regardless of their gender and marital status.

Public Assistance Act, Article 5, Paragraph 1 (2005)

To calculate the number of members living in the household defined in the first paragraph of Article 4include the following family members in addition to the applicant:

1. Spouse.

2. First-degree lineal blood relatives.

3. Siblings who live in the same dwelling or who are registered in the same household.

Because the applicant’s first-degree lineal blood relatives may be unable to take on the responsibility of maintenance, an exception of “exclusion of household members from calculation” was added as Paragraph 2 to Article 5. The responsibility of maintenance between the applicant and his/her first-degree lineal blood relatives are listed in the following two subparagraphs:

 Article 5, Paragraph 2, Subparagraph 3 states that “younger lineal blood relatives with no income, who are married, and live separately from the household members” are excluded from the calculation.

This subparagraph replaces “married daughters and uxorilocal sons” in the old Public Assistance Act with the term “married.” Therefore, if the applicant’s children are married and simultaneously satisfy the conditions of “no income,” “live separately,” and “unable to fulfill the responsibility of maintenance,” they are excluded from calculation for the members of the household.

 Article 5, Paragraph 2, Subparagraph 2 also excludes the “elderly lineal blood relatives of single families who live separately from the household members, and who have never actually raised any of the household members” from calculation. According to Article 3 of the Enforcement Rules of the Public Assistance Act, a “single family” refers to a family in which the parents are divorced, a spouse is dead, missing, or in prison, or in which a divorce verdict due to domestic violence was rendered.

According to Subparagraph 2, the applicant’s parents who “live separately” and “have never actually raised any of the household members” can be excluded from the calculation, with the result of increasing the chance of qualifying as a low-income household. This exception paragraph is applicable regardless of the applicant’s gender. Yet, based on the definition of “single family” in the Enforcement Rules of the Public Assistance Act, the paragraph is added in response to the requirements of female support.

3.2 Other Laws that Retain the “Married Daughters and Uxorilocal Sons” Clause

Despite the gender neutralization in the amendments of the Public Assistance Act, the “married daughters

and uxorilocal sons” clause continues to exist in various other public assistance laws. For example:

 The National Health Insurance Act: According to Article 8, Paragraph 1, Subparagraph 5 of the National Health Insurance Act, members of a low-income family household as defined by the Public Assistance Act are classified as Category 5 insured and the government should subsidize their premium in full. Subparagraph 2 of Article 15 of the Enforcement Rules of the National Health Insurance Act furthers defines the insured in Category 5 as the head of a household and “lineal blood relatives, non-lineal blood relatives, and the relatives that have a duty to support each other, while all of them have the same household registration with the head of a household or live together with the head of a household. Yet the younger lineal blood relatives of the head of a household are limited to the unmarried daughters and non-uxorilocal sons.” Hence the paradox: in the means test stage of the public assistance application, the married daughters of the applicant are considered members of a household and thus covered by the means test. Yet, once the applicant is qualified as part of a low-income family, the married daughters who live together or have the same household registration with the applicant cannot receive full government subsidization of their health insurance premium.

 Regulations on Living Allowance for Mid or Low-income Senior Citizens: The poverty line criteria of the living allowance for mid or low-income senior citizens include: “based on the combined average income of all resident family members, he/she has a total income of less than 2.5 times the lowest living index for that year according to the Public Assistance Act, and less than 1.5 times of the average monthly living cost in Taiwan.” The procedures and methods of the means test in the regulations are basically the same as those in the Public Assistant Act, yet the rules for the calculation of members of a household are different. According to Articles 7 and 8 of the regulations, an applicant’s (65 years of age and above) children with responsibility for maintenance and their spouses are included in the members of a household. Yet “married daughters, married sons as uxorilocal husbands, and spouses and children of these daughters and sons” who live separately and

“widowed daughter-in-laws or the widowed uxorilocal son-in-laws, and children of the daughter-in-laws or the uxorilocal son-in-laws” who live separately are excluded.

According to the interpretation of these articles, married daughters who live separately from their parents are consequentially cut off from their parents regarding family planning. By contrast, married sons are closely connected with their parents economically regardless of whether they live with their parents. The articles even assume that daughters-in-law and uxorilocal sons-in-law must be included as the members of the applicant’s household, unless they are widowed and no longer live together.

In summary, the identification of members of a household based on the patrilineal family system is relatively beneficial for the elderly. As a senior citizen, the applicant can exclude married daughters from the

members of the household by quoting the “married daughters and uxorilocal sons” clause and thus increase the chance of passing the means test. However, the mid-generation applicant with working ability who has parents and under-age children is disadvantaged. In this case, “first-degree lineal blood relatives” include the applicant, his/her parents, and children. These people are included as members of the applicant’s household regardless of the applicant’s marital status and economic connection to the parents.