It’s absurd people dumping on Taiwan don’t realise this. There is no way for Taiwan to compete with CCPs deep pockets if the CCP has decided it needs these engineers at all costs.

But again, TSMC not only isn't trying to compete with "CCPs deep pockets", they're not even trying to compete with Apple or Intel! The time for that complaint is if they're still seeing poaching despite paying FAANG-scale salaries commensurate with their now-FAANG-scale revenue.

To wit: TSMC is one of the big boys now, it's time to act like it and pay their workers. What they're doing right now is trying to cheat by using their government as a weapon against their own employees.