The insurance industry in Taiwan has indeed laid its foundation since Japanese ruled period. Back then, the whole market was monopolized by Japanese life insurance companies. Therefore, it would be fair to say that the introduction and promotion of insurance has both begun since then. In the past, the studies of the insurance industry put more emphasis on the period of time during WWII and holds that the drastic development of the insurance industry is a result of the war. As a matter of fact, the insurance industry in Taiwan has prospered before the war even started. In my master's thesis, I will mainly focus on the development of insurance industry before WWII. Started form 1896, the Japanese life insurance companies set its foot in Taiwan and bumped into a verity of difficulties in terms of cultural differences and unfamiliarity of the environment. As a result, this industry in Taiwan had difficulties in expanding its market in the first few years. And it would be not surprised that the insurance was mostly sold to Japanese, while Taiwanese only accounted for a small percentage.
The year of 1927 was a watershed moment for the insurance industry in Taiwan. In this year, the government-owned insurance companies started their business in Taiwan and have made great progress in the first ten years. According to the statistics, the insurance was mainly sold to Taiwanese instead of Japanese who stayed in Taiwan during that period of time. This result is totally opposite to the period of time when the privately-own companies dominated. Moreover, ever since the beginning of state-owned businesses, the privately-own companies have considerably grown in its performance as well. In the following parts, I will compare the development of both state-owned and privately-own companies and explain why state-owned companied can succeed in expanding its market in such a short time. Furthermore, I will discuss what kind of influence the state-own companies has put on the insurance industries during 1927-1937, during which both the state-owned and privately-own insurance companies have expanded drastically.
