What Is The True State Of The Thai Economy?

[KhaoYai]

There's very little in the news about the state of the economy in Thailand.  The baht slipped a little a few weeks ago but seems to have stabilised.  I haven't been able to get back to Thailand since March 2020 due to the current situation but I'm still in touch with friends and family in the country every day.

 

In my wife's immediate family in Korat (7 adults) she's the only one still working and even then, business is very much down. My friends elsewhere in the country, the story is very much the same - even those in Bangkok and very few of them work in tourist related businesses.

 

Normally, when you hear these kind of stories, a country is in severe recession.

 

What are your experiences? What are you hearing - real world?

[worgeordie]

It's the same everywhere , the rich are still getting richer,

and the poor are still getting screwed, there's a lot of debt,

and with so many in the tourism industry affected, things are

not good .but according to the Government everything is going

great........

regards worgeordie

[BenDeCosta]

Like your situation, most of my wife's family are out of work and desperately trying to get the odd few days work here and there. There have been a couple of burglaries in our village too, so it's a bit worrying. I suspect that it's worse than anyone wants to admit, but as this is Thailand, getting the truth is like getting blood from a stone.

 

One of our neighbours recently had their fairly new motorbike stolen too. But like Worgeordie says, the rich and elite are mostly unaffected, or even getting richer.

Edited June 4, 2021 by BenDeCosta

[WineOh]

Good luck finding out the answer to that.

 

 

[Kwasaki]

19 minutes ago, WineOh said:

Good luck finding out the answer to that.

 

 

I concur. 

[petermik]

22 minutes ago, WineOh said:

Good luck finding out the answer to that.

 

 

 

2 minutes ago, Kwasaki said:

I concur. 

norfolkandchance...????

[Kenny202]

Been pondering that one for some time. I have no clue about finances, stock markets etc but it seemed to me like Thailand was well on the downhill slide before Covid. Tourism was well down as were exports. Apparently their rice not a suitable high  grade or as competitive anymore not to mention the lack of good rain last few years. Car manufacturers seemed to be packing up and going else where. I did ask the question once and a guy who said he was a financial guy said it was all about the balance of trade...which would mean Thailand sells a lot to other countries but doesn't buy a lot. It just doesn't make any sense to me. There does seem some merit to the Thai baht being pinned to the US$ though. Aussies and brits complaining about the ex rate last 5 years but I believe the baht to US fairly steady. It is all an enigma to me. Be good to hear it explain. I am guessing though as someone else mentioned must have a lot to do with 98% of the wealth being with 2% of the population. 

[connda]

As in most countries, it is what the 'state' says it is as channeled and amplified by the main-stream media.
Which never gives you an accurate gauge of the Truth.
If you can handle the Truth, you drive around the city and view and count the business closures as well as the homeless.
It's sort of a rough, anecdotal economic measure that bypasses the government issued gobbly-gook.  Or you shut your eyes and hum "Everything's Coming Up Roses."
Perhaps the rich are getting richer but the economy and the public in general can be swimming in the toilet.

Edited June 4, 2021 by connda

[Fat is a type of crazy]

One reason it's not as bad as it might be is that borrowing funds is so cheap it's not such a big deal for Government's to borrow - easy to pay back .. until interest rates go up. 

Australia had a full on lock down but now is mostly back to normal with stock market high because government kept economy turning with lots of welfare.. iron doing well helps too.

 

As people say the government money in Thailand doesn't seem to be going a lot to the poor and average though.. the payments are fairly small so it must be seriously tough

[BenDeCosta]

When Western countries stop propping themselves up with furloughing, printing money, jobkeeper payments, and stimulus cheques, the brown stuff is really going to hit the fan big time.

[KhaoYai]

2 hours ago, WineOh said:

Good luck finding out the answer to that.

 

 

Why?  I'm not asking the Thai government, I'm asking members here what their experiences are. 

 

I suspect from my own experiences that things are pretty bad but I really don't know.  My wife's family are not connected to tourism in any way yet they are severely affected by the current situation. Everyone I speak to has no money and its been like that for a long time - I don't know how people are even eating.

 

No matter how much they manage the news, the government will find it difficult to cover up stories of people starving if that begins to happen.

[KhaoYai]

49 minutes ago, Fat is a type of crazy said:

As people say the government money in Thailand doesn't seem to be going a lot to the poor and average though.. the payments are fairly small so it must be seriously tough

Is the government still making those payments?  I may not have understood her correctly or she could be wrong but my wife told me there was a cap on the total payout, that's been reached so its finished.  Not that everyone got any anyway - there didn't seem to be any criteria for being able to claim the cash, it seemed to be a first come, first served handout.  Out of 7 adults in my wife's immediate family, 1 got the 5000 per month payment, I think for 3 months last year - since then nobody's had anything.

[KhaoYai]

1 hour ago, Kenny202 said:

Been pondering that one for some time. I have no clue about finances, stock markets etc but it seemed to me like Thailand was well on the downhill slide before Covid. Tourism was well down as were exports. Apparently their rice not a suitable high  grade or as competitive anymore not to mention the lack of good rain last few years. Car manufacturers seemed to be packing up and going else where. I did ask the question once and a guy who said he was a financial guy said it was all about the balance of trade...which would mean Thailand sells a lot to other countries but doesn't buy a lot. It just doesn't make any sense to me. There does seem some merit to the Thai baht being pinned to the US$ though. Aussies and brits complaining about the ex rate last 5 years but I believe the baht to US fairly steady. It is all an enigma to me. Be good to hear it explain. I am guessing though as someone else mentioned must have a lot to do with 98% of the wealth being with 2% of the population. 

I agree with most of what you say but with respect, I'm not really looking for the views of the so called experts - I'm asking members about their experiences to try and find out the real state of the economy not the false world of the stock markets etc. 

 

I want to know if the situation my wife's family finds themselves in is widespread.

[Logosone]

In recent years, economic growth slowed from 4.2% in 2018 to 2.4% in 2019. The key drivers of slowing growth were weaker demand for exports reflecting the impact of US-China trade tensions, slowing public investments, and a drought, impacting agricultural production. Key development challenges also pose a risk to Thailand’s future growth if it wants to attain high-income status by 2037. These include weakness in education outcomes and skills matching, which risk future productivity and chances of the younger generation, and increasing spatial inequality, with remote areas falling behind in economic and welfare indicators.

 

Economic growth in Thailand contracted to 6.1% in 2020 due to a decline in external demand affecting trade and tourism, supply chain disruptions, and weakening domestic consumption. The COVID-19 outbreak has created several additional challenges in the labor market. The primary impact has been a spike in unemployment rate, which doubled from 1% in the first quarter of 2019 to 2% in the second quarter of 2020.

 

Between 2015 and 2018, the poverty rate in Thailand increased from 7.2% to 9.8%, and the absolute number of people living in poverty rose from 4.85 million to more than 6.7 million. However, from 2018 to 2019, the poverty rate dropped to 6.2% and increased to 8.8% in 2020, due to the adverse effects of the COVID-19 pandemic crisis. 

 

https://www.worldbank.org/en/country/thailand/overview

[kokesaat]

" I'm asking members about their experiences to try and find out the real state of the economy not the false world of the stock markets etc."

 

I think it's a case of doing the math:  40 million people didn't visit the kingdom between Apr 2020 and Apr 2021, and now we're a few months into a second year of the same.  Restaurants, hotels, tourist spots, clubs, taxis, places like MBK, PhiPhi Island, and all the associated support structure to those visitors.......gone.....from 60-0 in a flash.  To make matters worse, the third wave has decimated any semblance of domestic tourism.  Just as an example, Udon......not what people consider an international tourist spot.......had 25+ domestic flights each day pre-covid.  Today, there are 3 or 4 daily flights and most of those flights are half full.  

That said, I was here in 1997 during Thaitanic.......where you could go days.....weeks...without seeing a red license plate.  Today?  In a place like Udon......there are plenty of red plates....and a good number of those on high end cars.  

I think the people least affected by the pandemic are farmers who don't rely on family members sending money home on a regular basis.  They've still got their farms, cattle, jungle to forage.  But if this cattle skin disease kills off the 'gold chain' around farmers' necks or if the weather gods don't cooperate with a good rice harvest, then the people at the bottom of the ladder will be affected as well.

 

[chalawaan]

Never mind the Thai economy, I'm amzed the ripple effects have still not smashed into the world, but the economy seems to be like a tanker turning, it takes a while for the wheelhouse to see the results. 

Apart from bars and restaurants, all my visits to Homepro have dried up, I'm taking this seriously, and stay out of harms way, as I have oft wrote, dying is not the problem, it's living with the unknowable damage of the aftermath, get this thing bad, and you may as well be dead anyway, from all credible reports. 

 

So, we are going to see vast lockdown economic blowback, which just has to arrive at some point, since every job loss ripples out into the moneyverse, as does, every death (yes they're not huge figures -so far -but this thing mutates) set aside the deaths, you have careers that will be destroyed by the crippling effects of severe long-covid and other chronic debilitations we are just beginning to understand. 

 

The costs as well as losses from Covid, are currently ignored, the idiot media bang on about Amazons profits forgetting that somebody has to fork out to create a profit. 

 

All of this, plus the usual threats to the economy, that have not diminished: future natural disasters, wars, other diseases, and plagues (the Aussie mouse plauge ongoing, the costly trade embargoes China is running, the gobsmacking lunacy of Brexit, and as always, the little guy gets the shaft, everything from confiscated sandwiches to deported from Spain, to the debacle of the "truckport" they built in the Kent countryside, think of the energy bill for that alone, much less the wuzzocks who voted for it, and now bleating about the trucks, the noise, and the lights all night. 

 

So yeah, a hard rain is gonna fall, and it looks like Covid is that elusive "cure for stupid" we've waited for. It just arrived too late to save Engerland.

[KhaoYai]

3 hours ago, KhaoYai said:

What are your experiences? What are you hearing - real world?

Just reminding people of the original question.

[chalawaan]

1 minute ago, KhaoYai said:

Just reminding people of the original question.

And my real world experiences, and what I'm hearing, are detailed above, thanks.

Oh, the maid has stopped coming around, but that's not really comparable to being a minimum wage Thai tour lackey, so I can't comment on how that must feel.

[Fat is a type of crazy]

1 hour ago, KhaoYai said:

Is the government still making those payments?  I may not have understood her correctly or she could be wrong but my wife told me there was a cap on the total payout, that's been reached so its finished.  Not that everyone got any anyway - there didn't seem to be any criteria for being able to claim the cash, it seemed to be a first come, first served handout.  Out of 7 adults in my wife's immediate family, 1 got the 5000 per month payment, I think for 3 months last year - since then nobody's had anything.

Sounds right The government can borrow cheap money but whether it's going to the people who need it like in Australia is a different thing. My girlfriend is in Ubon and people she knows don't seem to get much if anything after a payment some time ago as you say 

Edited June 4, 2021 by Fat is a type of crazy

[statman78]

I’m in Chiang Rai and the economy is terrible.  The city is extremely quiet.  There are many storefronts with for sale or rent signs.  Every month there are more.  My wife and I frequent a couple of restaurants in town and the owners say they don’t know how long they can stay open.  My wife has a couple of friends who are in the tour guide business and they have give up.  I expect more places to close as this third wave continues.

Edited June 4, 2021 by statman78

[sammieuk1]

Ask any general and the answer will be people have never had it so good everyone is as happy as a pig in grit????

[BenDeCosta]

25 minutes ago, statman78 said:

I’m in Chiang Rai and the economy is terrible.  The city is extremely quiet.  There are many storefronts with for sale or rent signs.  Every month there are more.  My wife and I frequent a couple of restaurants in town and the owners say they don’t know how long they can stay open.  My wife has a couple of friends who are in the tour guide business and they have give up.  I expect more places to close as this third wave continues.

 

But the people making the rules only care about themselves and their own bank balances and the poorer the people become, the more power the government has over them.

[chalawaan]

1 hour ago, KhaoYai said:

Why?  I'm not asking the Thai government, I'm asking members here what their experiences are. 

 

I suspect from my own experiences that things are pretty bad but I really don't know.  My wife's family are not connected to tourism in any way yet they are severely affected by the current situation. Everyone I speak to has no money and its been like that for a long time - I don't know how people are even eating.

 

No matter how much they manage the news, the government will find it difficult to cover up stories of people starving if that begins to happen.

As I said, I have not been out much, apart from walking to Tops nearby, my wife is in Bkk with the car, and looking after an 88 yo relative there. This time last year I was in Bkk slumming around Soi 4 and it was a ghost town, although places like The Kiwi were open. Before You tube changed its ToS you could see actual street videos of Pattaya and Bangkok, but now, anyone appearing in those videos must be blurred out, or permission given to film, these videos were using hidden cameras, if they're still up you'll get the 'real world' in buckets watching them, it is not pretty.

 

It has also occurred to me that crime must rise, but I'm thinking that will be more from the poor sods from Myanmar, living off their wits, than the locals. There are two reasons for this, the strong familial bond among Thai, and the fact that, if one gets out of the big cities, it is almost impossible to "starve" since there are edible wild plants and free fruit and veges all over the place, literally growing on trees. Fresh drinking water may become an issue if everything gets worse.

But alas, bereft of wheels, or even the desire to drive about gawking at the ruined economy, my "real world" experience is limited to my crib and the shops, in the local mall, smaller businesses, mainly food based, have long been closed, even crowd pleasers like MK are near deserted. 

[Leaver]

On 6/4/2021 at 4:00 PM, KhaoYai said:

Normally, when you hear these kind of stories, a country is in severe recession.

 

What are your experiences? What are you hearing - real world?

 

I'm hearing about sick buffalo.  

 

Good times, or recession, the buffalo is always sick here.  ????

[rumak]

On 6/4/2021 at 5:39 PM, BenDeCosta said:

When Western countries stop propping themselves up with furloughing, printing money, jobkeeper payments, and stimulus cheques, the brown stuff is really going to hit the fan big time.

why would they stop ?    if any of it made any sense (like trying to run a REAL business) it all would have gone to hell long ago.

its all just make believe "money" ........... and yet it seems to have an endless limit.  

the word "debt"  and  " your grandchildren are going to have to pay for it"  appear to me

to be just a fairy tale.    

 

[rumak]

My guess , from what others here are saying,  is that most areas in Thailand are having

a difficult time.

 

I live in Chiangmai, though,  and my observation is the whole area within a radius of maybe 25 km  is experiencing a population boom.   Land prices are up,  rice fields are being bought up and turned into housing estates ( most seem to be low end  2 to 3 million baht) for a basic house on 60 talangwa of land.

 

Could it be that this will be the future Bangkok ?   Ring roads are filling up and there is still plenty more land .  When economies are bad,  people drift ( or flock ?)  to the area which

has more work.   Chiangmai seems to be fitting that criteria....... and more people means more money .    Still distributed as always, of course :  The rich will get richer ,  most others will be working for 25 years to pay off their mortgage

[AlexRich]

I wonder how this period compares to the Asian financial crisis of the late 1990’s? The Baht has been relatively strong but back then I believe it got hammered?

[RichardColeman]

2 hours ago, Leaver said:

 

I'm hearing about sick buffalo.  

 

Good times, or recession, the buffalo is always sick here.  ????

I'm pretty sure the buffalo has starved to death now and they need money for a new one 

[Leaver]

12 hours ago, rumak said:

I live in Chiangmai, though,  and my observation is the whole area within a radius of maybe 25 km  is experiencing a population boom. 

 

I know two bar girls that have gone home to have children during this time. They are using covid time for family planning purposes.  ????

[rumak]

9 minutes ago, Leaver said:

 

I know two bar girls that have gone home to have children during this time. They are using covid time for family planning purposes.  ????

 

Not sure how that relates to my post .    But if necessary,  i have proof that i never came closer than 25 km to those two girls