Typical Thailand.
They dont appreciate that "rich pensioners" and "rich global citizens" would not want to live long term in Thailand.
Thailand will always attract the lower/middle status of people. Its a third world country, with massive levels of corruption, unsafe roads, and many other downsides.
It will be another failure..........and in 12 months time there will be a "committee" meeting looking into why so few people applied for the LTR.............
Thailand loves committees why should any one person have to have any responsibility, better have a committee and then nobody has to take the blame for failure..........
They should just accept where Thailand is in the world - make a LTR visa simple for most people and then reap the benefits.
But that means a few people losing face.............and Thai's, like Chinese.......hate losing face.