Memory makers are riding a historic AI-driven price boom, and Micron’s workers in Taiwan want a formula that shares the windfall. Two unions representing about 10,000 employees are preparing for a possible strike, with roughly 80 percent of members polled backing industrial action, Reuters reported.
The dispute is not about base pay but about how bonuses are set. Unions want Micron’s discretionary Incentive Pay Plan replaced with a profit-sharing scheme whose math workers can see and verify.
Korean rivals set the benchmark. Samsung’s chip division pays out 10.5 percent of profits to employees, and SK hynix allocates 10 percent of annual operating profit. Micron’s Taiwan bonuses cap at 200 percent of target, equal to about five months of salary, but actual payouts have averaged closer to 2.6 months.
Timing gives the unions leverage. AI buyers are absorbing memory capacity, prices are climbing, and manufacturers are booking record profits even as employees argue their cut has not kept pace.
Mediation is scheduled into mid-September, and a formal strike vote could follow if talks collapse. A walkout would be rare in Taiwan’s fab sector, where highly specialized production depends on skilled staff and any disruption would ripple through already-tight memory supply.
