BritManToo

I seem to be living a western lifestyle on a pension of 1,000 pounds a month quite easily (family of 5). It was a little harder when the exchange got me 40kbht and I had a kid at university. But she finished earlier this yer, got a job, moved out and the exchange rate now gives me 45k/month. At 45k/month I have 5k-10k left I don't need each month. Western food doesn't cost any more than Thai food, same ingredients, different cooking style. as for, "live in their reclining chair, unable to go anywhere, do anything, afford anything." Nowhere to go, nothing much to do for the past 2 years due to COVID, even if I wanted.

It would depend on your pension scheme rules. My company will pay my misses 65% of my pension. Same age difference.

Thai taxation office publishes similar figures. All my wife's family are farmers, there's 100s of them and they've never paid any tax. I'm putting you on ignore, not worth reading your posts. Think of it as getting off my bar stool and walking away from you.

You'd be wrong .............. https://asiafoundation.org/2015/04/15/thailand-and-taxes/ "Many Thais, both rich and poor, are simply outside of the tax system. Just three million Thais out of 67 million regularly pay income taxes." Once you do the calculations to remove kids and OAPs from the 67M, you're left with 30-40M Thais of working age.

Would point out 80% of Thais don't pay income tax. Revenue is collected mainly through corporation tax, import duty and VAT. I avoid dual pricing by never entering a place that plays that game. My local hospital (San Sai) makes me pay an extra 50bht, and I'm OK with that.

Not me. As a very polite and compassionate foreigner I'm prepared to wait for all the Thais to get theirs first.

Hard to tell as dissent may lose you your medical licence. I'd prefer a situation where everyone was allowed to freely voice their opinion without fear of censure.

Use mine nearly every day, no problems.

It would be interesting to relate this to the 12 fully vaccinated but infected staff at the Hua Hin restaurant. Small number ........ I wonder how many staff there were, and what percentage were infected. Let's hope 'small number' is not equal to everyone.

I thought we all used air fryers these days ........ no oil at all.

You'd think the sick could avoid going to bars. Maybe stay at home and take a few precautions to protect themselves. Especially now the CDC says vaccination doesn't stop transmission. (As demonstrated by the 12 fully vaccinated restaurant staff in Hua Hin all diagnosed with COVID) As for vaccination, If someone were to turn up at my door with a free vaccination and a document accepted by the UK government as 'proof of vaccination' allowing me to re-enter the UK without quarantine, I'd probably say OK. But as it stands I'd need to be re-vaccinated again in the UK for it to count.

Most Thais want Thaksin to be their leader. As far as I can see.

I just have a SSD for my OS, and everything else is on my ZyXel NAS or 4TB USB drives. IMHO internal storage drives are things of the past.

CDC says vaccine doesn't stop transmission of COVID. A recent news story claims 12 fully vaccinated staff in a Hua Hin restaurant had COVID. CDC says vaccinated people should still wear masks and social distance.

Don't build on flood plains, and if you must, build on pillars. Not sure why you think floods will be worse in the future, they seem the same as always to me.

She'll get a pay increase next month when she finishes her 3 month probation. English wasn't required to get the job, so she didn't tell them she spoke English.

No way, my kid as a new graduate gets a starting wage of 18k/month in CM and hasn't even told them she can speak English. 25k for someone that is fluent in BK or you'll be disappointed.

Watched 10 minutes ........ the most woke multi cultural garbage imaginable. The actors are the most completely hopeless ever, and just seem to have been employed on the basis of not being white.

No, I think the Thai government doesn't really care about tourists coming. They are just posturing to appease the local hotel owners and staff.

Never saw any point in looking at photos/videos of naked women. Having them sit on my lap .......... entirely different. People who pay $20 to see photos of a topless model ............ losers.

28-35 years old, weighing 38-50Kg.

If my pension were to become worthless it would probably mean TEOTWAWKI. In which case a few 45Kg sacks of rice hidden in sealed bins would probably be worth more than all the gold/crypto in the world. Can't imagine Thailand surviving the crash of the western monetary system in it's current form.

Don't see a problem, Mom and Pop stores and booze shops will sell to you any time of the day. Restricted selling hours are only kept by the supermarket chains. I'm happy to sit at home and drink alone on the patio. Saves me lots of money.

Sticky waterfalls, about 30Km up the 1001 (aka Nam Tok Bua Tong). Free entry and parking, and the kids love walking up the waterfalls.

I was invited to join the monks at Wat Chedi Luang in Chiang Mai 10 years back. They said I should try it for a week or two, but I could stay as long as I liked, no charge.