Wage debate ignores obscene incomes

[manarak]

I think a blanket minimum salary is a bad thing to have.

The reasons are:

- a minimum salary disregards personal situations, particulary living costs of employees. For example, one empoyee could live with his family and have no accomodation cost, while the other could have rent to pay. What about small businesses that don't do enough money to pay everyone a minimum salary?

- expansion of employee numbers. this leads to an expansion of accomodation renters, and expansion of people who are unable to subsist without a salary, as opposed to small businesses. it expands the number of people in the economy who just are "dependent", at first from their salary, and when that fails, they will be dependent on welfare and other people's taxes.

- another reason is that higher minimum wage causes expansion of mass consumption. Mass consumption is nefarious because people buy things that will be worthless in 5 years time.

- higher wages cause an expansion of credit, and with the expansion of credit more money will flow into different markets, one of them being the real estate market, where prices will continue to rise, putting real estate progressively completely out of anyone's reach.

- higher minimum wage makes it more difficult to privately employ other people. look at western countries where even families that are well-off can't afford staff.

Finally, I think it is laughable that the government wants to raise minimum wage when at the same time it is unable to pay police officers enough to ensure they don't need to accept bribes to pay their family's bills.

[tompix321]

If you ask 301 B for something worth 299 B, there will be no transaction. It's as simple as that. Raising the minimum wage without increasing productivity just leads to higher unemployment. Some will get 60 B more per day, but some will get 300 B less per day.

If you really want to improve the lives of workers you should promote incentives to increase productivity rather than populist and counter-productive measures like a minimum wage. Education, automation, research and development, investment, free trade and competition all help to boost productivity long term.

[wwest5829]

This is not the issue of how much the Thai worker is worth, this is really about the quality work of the local labor, which is quite crappy, Thai workers in general are not productive as their counterpart in China and VN, in most cases, they're lazy, irresponsible, dishonest and all around disloyal and uninspiring people to work with, hence the law remunerations they get for their mi pen rai attitude, I ought to know, I have employed hundreds of them in my factories both in Bkk and in up country....

I do take your point as regards productivity. But this wealth gap can be seen worldwide. It has gotten to the point in many countries, especially my own, that it is tearing at the social fabric of society. In the U.S., productivity has increased many times over and yet the wages have not correspondingly be raised to reflect the rise in productivity. So, again, there certainly should be a tying of wages to the quality of the work performed but the gap must be closed if we are to hope to live in peace and in societies where the citizen believes they are getting a fair shake with a hope of bettering their lives. I favor taking part of employees wages as company stock. The company does well, all employees do well and there must be a reasonable limiting of obscene executive salaries/bonuses.

[Traveler19491]

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If you ask 301 B for something worth 299 B, there will be no transaction. It's as simple as that. Raising the minimum wage without increasing productivity just leads to higher unemployment. Some will get 60 B more per day, but some will get 300 B less per day.

If you really want to improve the lives of workers you should promote incentives to increase productivity rather than populist and counter-productive measures like a minimum wage. Education, automation, research and development, investment, free trade and competition all help to boost productivity long term.

Your first premise is totally flawed. The worth of the item is determined by the purchaser. Case in point: I enjoy my SangSom. I can buy that in a number of places, including 7-11 for 299 baht, or a little mom and pop place a bit further away for 265 baht. Suppose I really, really want a SangSom and coke. Where do I buy it? Always at the mom and pop? No. Sometimes I run to 7-11 because it is closer to where I live. So factors other than just the "worth" of the product have to be factored in.

I would also debate your second assertion, that any rise in the minimum wage will necessary lead to layoffs. This same argument is consistently trotted out in the US whenever a rise in the minimum wage is proposed. The conservatives use this one every single time, and they have yet to ever provide supporting documentation. Are there some layoffs? Undoubtedly, especially in businesses that are already skating on thin ice. However, overall there has yet to be a net loss of jobs. In fact, most of the states or municipalities that independently boost the minimum wage tend to see job growth due to the increased economic activity that results from the higher wages. Those living on a minimum wage do not save that money, and they do not invest that money. They spend it, immediately. That money goes directly back into the economy and typically increases employment.

[Traveler19491]

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I think a blanket minimum salary is a bad thing to have.

The reasons are:

- a minimum salary disregards personal situations, particulary living costs of employees. For example, one empoyee could live with his family and have no accomodation cost, while the other could have rent to pay. What about small businesses that don't do enough money to pay everyone a minimum salary?

- expansion of employee numbers. this leads to an expansion of accomodation renters, and expansion of people who are unable to subsist without a salary, as opposed to small businesses. it expands the number of people in the economy who just are "dependent", at first from their salary, and when that fails, they will be dependent on welfare and other people's taxes.

- another reason is that higher minimum wage causes expansion of mass consumption. Mass consumption is nefarious because people buy things that will be worthless in 5 years time.

- higher wages cause an expansion of credit, and with the expansion of credit more money will flow into different markets, one of them being the real estate market, where prices will continue to rise, putting real estate progressively completely out of anyone's reach.

- higher minimum wage makes it more difficult to privately employ other people. look at western countries where even families that are well-off can't afford staff.

Finally, I think it is laughable that the government wants to raise minimum wage when at the same time it is unable to pay police officers enough to ensure they don't need to accept bribes to pay their family's bills.

I'm not really sure what the end result is that your treatise is aiming for. You seem to be proposing a society where the workers live purely on the benevolence of the employer.

- Why should a person who lives with family make less than someone who rents an apartment? The extra money saved by living with family could be used for the overall betterment of the entire family. As to the businesses that don't have ("do") enough money to pay everyone a minimum salary...if your profit margin is so small that you can't afford to pay your employees a minimum, then you either have a bad business model, your other expenses are too high, or you have under priced your product. Or, maybe you have too many employees?

- An "expansion of accommodation renters" is bad...why? Then you posit that people requiring a salary is also a bad thing, suggesting that every single person should be an independent business person, which is a totally unsustainable economic model. Actually, an expansion of employees is something that every business should hope for, as that would indicate that the business is growing.

- An "expansion of mass consumption". Unless you are ready to go back to a totally agrarian economy, mass consumption is the driving force behind capitalism. And unless you plan to buy nothing more than products made of granite, pretty much everything is going to have a life span in the range of 3 - 10 years. Stuff wears out.

- "...with the expansion of credit more money will flow into different markets..." Ummm, you were apparently out for the entirety of Economics 101. This is exactly how capitalist markets work, and is deemed a GOOD thing. Markets expanding creates new jobs, which raises everyone's economic situation...unless those markets are controlled by oligarchs, which you are beginning to sound more and more like.

- OK, yup, oligarch. "Look at western countries where even families that are well off can't afford staff." Goddam working class! Always whining about wanting more! How can I pay them another 60 baht a day and still keep the cook, the 5 maids, the butler, the gardener, or the chauffeur? And that's to say NOTHING about the crew for either the yacht or my two jets! These peons have absolutely NO sensitivity to the needs of someone at my station in life. Screw 'em...let 'em eat cake!

[ChrisY1]

This is not the issue of how much the Thai worker is worth, this is really about the quality work of the local labor, which is quite crappy, Thai workers in general are not productive as their counterpart in China and VN, in most cases, they're lazy, irresponsible, dishonest and all around disloyal and uninspiring people to work with, hence the law remunerations they get for their mi pen rai attitude, I ought to know, I have employed hundreds of them in my factories both in Bkk and in up country....

Perhaps you get what you pay for, or your line management needs improvement. I have worked with Thais around the world. They are like everyone else. There are good, bad, and everything in between. Like any nationality, workers need to be properly motivated.

Thais working internationally are not the same people as Thais working at home....I too have worked with Thais in marine construction everywhere....and yes..they're very good.......they have to be as there's so much competition....but back here is a completely different story!

[Sealbash]

This is not the issue of how much the Thai worker is worth, this is really about the quality work of the local labor, which is quite crappy, Thai workers in general are not productive as their counterpart in China and VN, in most cases, they're lazy, irresponsible, dishonest and all around disloyal and uninspiring people to work with, hence the law remunerations they get for their mi pen rai attitude, I ought to know, I have employed hundreds of them in my factories both in Bkk and in up country....

Perhaps you get what you pay for, or your line management needs improvement. I have worked with Thais around the world. They are like everyone else. There are good, bad, and everything in between. Like any nationality, workers need to be properly motivated.

Thais working internationally are not the same people as Thais working at home....I too have worked with Thais in marine construction everywhere....and yes..they're very good.......they have to be as there's so much competition....but back here is a completely different story!

Do you think the fact they make more than minimum wage might be part of the motivation?

[Robby nz]

My daughter ,4 years at Uni,can speak,read and write Thai,English and Mandarin,

graduated with 1st degree honours,offered jobs in the Hotel industry of 9K THB p.m

6 days per week,1 weeks paid holiday after 1 year,finding a job is easy,but working

for those wages!,you could make more working in 7-11,without a Uni education

relax Countryman.

But. But Yingluck promised every Uni grad a starting salary of 15,000 a month and she told us that, in relation to the rice pledging scheme, according to law election promises must be kept.

The 300b minimum wage was not always paid and got round in some instances by putting workers on contract, farm laborers are a great example.

In other cases the 300 was paid but those on higher wages did not have theirs increased in line.

An example of this is the ladys sister who was teaching the job to new workers in a factory, she was already on 300b, when the min wage was introduced those she was teaching were put on the same wage as her, she was not amused.

[maidee]

anyone noticed that most of meat in tesco now is CP only

and CP likes to state their crops are GMO & meat GMO fed

monopoly gives you no choice to buy NOT GMO

many thousands of workers in factories killing animals like bandwork in an auto factory

[Thai at Heart]

There is virtually no empirical evidence that minimum wage increases instantly lead to job losses. The reasons are complex but there is no proof that it causes job losses.

[manarak]

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I think a blanket minimum salary is a bad thing to have.

The reasons are:

- a minimum salary disregards personal situations, particulary living costs of employees. For example, one empoyee could live with his family and have no accomodation cost, while the other could have rent to pay. What about small businesses that don't do enough money to pay everyone a minimum salary?

- expansion of employee numbers. this leads to an expansion of accomodation renters, and expansion of people who are unable to subsist without a salary, as opposed to small businesses. it expands the number of people in the economy who just are "dependent", at first from their salary, and when that fails, they will be dependent on welfare and other people's taxes.

- another reason is that higher minimum wage causes expansion of mass consumption. Mass consumption is nefarious because people buy things that will be worthless in 5 years time.

- higher wages cause an expansion of credit, and with the expansion of credit more money will flow into different markets, one of them being the real estate market, where prices will continue to rise, putting real estate progressively completely out of anyone's reach.

- higher minimum wage makes it more difficult to privately employ other people. look at western countries where even families that are well-off can't afford staff.

Finally, I think it is laughable that the government wants to raise minimum wage when at the same time it is unable to pay police officers enough to ensure they don't need to accept bribes to pay their family's bills.

I'm not really sure what the end result is that your treatise is aiming for. You seem to be proposing a society where the workers live purely on the benevolence of the employer.

- Why should a person who lives with family make less than someone who rents an apartment? The extra money saved by living with family could be used for the overall betterment of the entire family. As to the businesses that don't have ("do") enough money to pay everyone a minimum salary...if your profit margin is so small that you can't afford to pay your employees a minimum, then you either have a bad business model, your other expenses are too high, or you have under priced your product. Or, maybe you have too many employees?

- An "expansion of accommodation renters" is bad...why? Then you posit that people requiring a salary is also a bad thing, suggesting that every single person should be an independent business person, which is a totally unsustainable economic model. Actually, an expansion of employees is something that every business should hope for, as that would indicate that the business is growing.

- An "expansion of mass consumption". Unless you are ready to go back to a totally agrarian economy, mass consumption is the driving force behind capitalism. And unless you plan to buy nothing more than products made of granite, pretty much everything is going to have a life span in the range of 3 - 10 years. Stuff wears out.

- "...with the expansion of credit more money will flow into different markets..." Ummm, you were apparently out for the entirety of Economics 101. This is exactly how capitalist markets work, and is deemed a GOOD thing. Markets expanding creates new jobs, which raises everyone's economic situation...unless those markets are controlled by oligarchs, which you are beginning to sound more and more like.

- OK, yup, oligarch. "Look at western countries where even families that are well off can't afford staff." Goddam working class! Always whining about wanting more! How can I pay them another 60 baht a day and still keep the cook, the 5 maids, the butler, the gardener, or the chauffeur? And that's to say NOTHING about the crew for either the yacht or my two jets! These peons have absolutely NO sensitivity to the needs of someone at my station in life. Screw 'em...let 'em eat cake!

1- it's about cost of labor and and benefits of doing the work. In Western welfare countries many tasks are just not done because the benefits/costs ratio is not sustainable, i.e. nobody wants to do the work for the small money, and those who do, ask expensive prices, so that the service is not affordable by most anymore.

It began with taxis, laundries, etc. but now it extends to nurses.

On the other hand, without a minimum wage and with low cost of living, people with low costs would agree to do a job that wouldn't sustain renters. Renters would have to seek better paying jobs.

2- expansion of accomodation renters and of employees is bad because it makes people less independent.

The rent puts pressure on people to find a job to pay for their accomodation.

Mortgages are worse, because people are the subject to a lot of pressure to pay their real estate. Credit expansion of course makes it look like a good thing, because as the money flows in, it puts an upward pressure on the prices.

It is healthy that a larger number of people remain independent, for example by running small businesses, because this allows to balance out wages, i.e. are they better off with a wage or with doing a small business?

And there is your minimum wage.

3- mass consumption is indeed important for capitalism, but when it is fueled by credit, it can become very bad, because people take on loans to pay for stuff that will quickly become worthless, and they can't even afford it in the first place! Again, cut the credit.

Then, there is a second very vicious side of consumerism in Western countries: since the West is not anymore able to produce consumer goods at an acceptable price, the consequence is that people take up loans to pay for goods that are IMPORTED, i.e. the money flows out and doesn't come back !

4- money flowing into markets is not always a good thing, depending on who the money belongs to. It is a good thing when the money belongs to private persons. It ios a bad thing when the money is really big money that belongs to pension funds, banks, etc. fueled by credit expansion. They buy up the valuable land, put prices up, and build rental accomodations, prices rise more, so do the rents... squeeze squeeze squeeze

The consequence of this is to put real estate (which is one of the few REAL WEALTH items) out of reach of the middle class, unless the waghe earner agrees to a 40 year mortgage...

I say, after working 10 years an upper middle class employee should be able to buy an ok house (let's say 100 sqm, three bedrooms, within 30 minutes of his workplace) and pay for most of it with CASH.

5- the idea of having staff being reserved to an elite is deeply ingrained in Western minds, yet it is normal in many middle class families across the world.

I say a country needs (very) low wage earners. The state needs to provide for education, healthcare and equal opportunities.

What happened in Western countries is that minimum wages eroded the middle class as did higher taxes while helping the superrich to become even richer.

For example, after taxes and social transfers, the 20:20 ratio between highest and lowest incomes is only 2.2 in France. The 10:10 is only 3.4

This is symptomatic for a country where everything is just too expensive to buy for about everyone except the rich, but their numbers are dwindling.

A country can't function properly like that, my take is that the 20:20 ratio needs to be at least 5 after taxes.

Incidentially, public expenditure makes up 58% of France's GDP, accompanied by industrial desertification and record unemployment.

Western countries inflate demand by distributing money just to keep the VAT carousel spinning and to try to support the local industries (which eventually fails).

Therefore I would welcome a minimum legal interest rate of 5% and to bind currency value to a basket of physical goods (zero inflation) - this should halt debt-fueled consumerism in its tracks and also ensure it is not financed by inflation.

[moe666]

This is not the issue of how much the Thai worker is worth, this is really about the quality work of the local labor, which is quite crappy, Thai workers in general are not productive as their counterpart in China and VN, in most cases, they're lazy, irresponsible, dishonest and all around disloyal and uninspiring people to work with, hence the law remunerations they get for their mi pen rai attitude, I ought to know, I have employed hundreds of them in my factories both in Bkk and in up country....

The usual Thais are lazy rant, my girlfriend works for a hotel here in CM she is paid 9,000baht a montzh even though she has to work 12 hour shifts and she is the only one who spreaks english. Her co workers are hard working people as well doing many functions outside of what they were hired to do. Your rant flys in the face of what really goes on poor management, abusive management and down right stupid management.

I have worked with lazy people, thieves, and conartist all in the states you find them every where, but who hired them management.

[NeverSure]

You can make a law raising wages, but you can't make a law requiring businesses to stay where they are and pay it. This fact drove a lot of Western jobs to Thailand and could drive jobs out of Thailand.

You can make a law regarding wages, but you can't make a law stopping businesses from automating the process. I can tell you what happened to the careers of bank tellers and their supervisors when ATM machines became widely available.

We are on the edge of robotics and automation and each push against businesses accelerates it. I now mail just two utility bills and pay everything else online, automated by computers. People used to handle that at all levels, giving jobs even to the postman.

The United States has developed robotics which can make clothing without human intervention. This is going to be a sea change from shipping cotton to China, managing businesses in China, and then paying to ship finished product back.

Robots work cheaper than Thais and this is partly why auto manufacturers aren't opening new plants in Thailand if anywhere else in SE Asia. People don't even paint new cars today. Robots do. There's a very skilled job into the dumpster.

Unskilled labor will always have limited value and in the future much of it will have NO value. At no other time in history has it been more important for people to look to their futures and improve their own value rather than expecting a dependable life on an assembly line.

Edited April 11, 2015 by NeverSure

[tompix321]

The worth of the item is determined by the purchaser. Case in point: I enjoy my SangSom. I can buy that in a number of places, including 7-11 for 299 baht, or a little mom and pop place a bit further away for 265 baht. Suppose I really, really want a SangSom and coke. Where do I buy it? Always at the mom and pop? No. Sometimes I run to 7-11 because it is closer to where I live. So factors other than just the "worth" of the product have to be factored in.

I would also debate your second assertion, that any rise in the minimum wage will necessary lead to layoffs. This same argument is consistently trotted out in the US whenever a rise in the minimum wage is proposed. The conservatives use this one every single time, and they have yet to ever provide supporting documentation. Are there some layoffs? Undoubtedly, especially in businesses that are already skating on thin ice. However, overall there has yet to be a net loss of jobs. In fact, most of the states or municipalities that independently boost the minimum wage tend to see job growth due to the increased economic activity that results from the higher wages. Those living on a minimum wage do not save that money, and they do not invest that money. They spend it, immediately. That money goes directly back into the economy and typically increases employment.

The fact that the buyers evaluation is the relevant one does not contradict my statement. If you value your SangSom at 350 you can buy it at several places if you include the cost/value of getting to the shop etc. My point was that we (rational entities) do not trade a high value for a lower one. The point is used to explain what economists know about demand and supply. There is a limit where you would say, "Sod it! I'll get a couple of Changs instead or travel far to get a better deal!". Employers can't function at a loss indefinitely. In Seattle unemployment has not gone up but it has gone up less than in the rest of the country. There are many examples (even in Thailand) where people lose their jobs because of the minimum wage. If minimum wage was a good policy Sweden, Norway and Switzerland would be poor countries or at least countries with huge income gaps. The opposite is true.

[NeverSure]

If minimum wage was a good policy Sweden, Norway and Switzerland would be poor countries or at least countries with huge income gaps. The opposite is true.

It isn't over for those countries. They are still in an experiment with an overall outcome that doesn't look all that good.

No one ever started a business with the goal of making other people rich. He did it to try to make himself rich.

All around us we have the products of motivated people who started a business to make a lot of money. That includes our desks, chairs, computer and internet connection. It's all through my house and it's parked in my driveway.

If we remove that large profit incentive we will remove the incentive to invent, develop, and advance and it will hurt everyone.

[Torrens54]

This is not the issue of how much the Thai worker is worth, this is really about the quality work of the local labor, which is quite crappy, Thai workers in general are not productive as their counterpart in China and VN, in most cases, they're lazy, irresponsible, dishonest and all around disloyal and uninspiring people to work with, hence the law remunerations they get for their mi pen rai attitude, I ought to know, I have employed hundreds of them in my factories both in Bkk and in up country....

Good for you. This needed to be said, not that many of our Thai friends will agree but you are spot on with your assessment.

As for Execs pay rates, I EARNED every CENT I ever got and so did my colleagues. I paid my staff ABOVE award wages, some responded very well but sadly the majority thought they should be paid to slack-off and so too did their stinking Unions.

[hawker9000]

managers are not faithfull to the company ... when they can make more money, they just leave

they have golden contracts, illegal for normal workers

start with a big signing bonus

and a golden parachute when they leave, either by their own will, or when they are incompetent

5,10,20 million dollars bonus, for not doing their job

plus the diguesting fixed salary & a bonus equal or many times that

managers are psychopaths ... they come in with their big cat salary, have no problem getting half of the staff fired, don't care, as long as the shareholders (mostly they also got a bonus in shares) are better off

money & greed is the root of all evil

thai people already know greed... only the 1% get also the money & the power that comes with it

"managers are psychopaths ... "

No one really need read anything further that you have to say.

[micmichd]

managers are not faithfull to the company ... when they can make more money, they just leave

they have golden contracts, illegal for normal workers

start with a big signing bonus

and a golden parachute when they leave, either by their own will, or when they are incompetent

5,10,20 million dollars bonus, for not doing their job

plus the diguesting fixed salary & a bonus equal or many times that

managers are psychopaths ... they come in with their big cat salary, have no problem getting half of the staff fired, don't care, as long as the shareholders (mostly they also got a bonus in shares) are better off

money & greed is the root of all evil

thai people already know greed... only the 1% get also the money & the power that comes with it

"managers are psychopaths ... "

No one really need read anything further that you have to say.

One of them (German Commerzbank leader Martin Blessing) doubled his income last year, he got 106.8 MB approximately last year.

Commerzbank was (or still is) supported by German taxpayers, they were actually bankruptct since 2008 - but "too big to fail"

Edited April 12, 2015 by micmichd

[hawker9000]

managers are not faithfull to the company ... when they can make more money, they just leave

they have golden contracts, illegal for normal workers

start with a big signing bonus

and a golden parachute when they leave, either by their own will, or when they are incompetent

5,10,20 million dollars bonus, for not doing their job

plus the diguesting fixed salary & a bonus equal or many times that

managers are psychopaths ... they come in with their big cat salary, have no problem getting half of the staff fired, don't care, as long as the shareholders (mostly they also got a bonus in shares) are better off

money & greed is the root of all evil

thai people already know greed... only the 1% get also the money & the power that comes with it

"managers are psychopaths ... "

No one really need read anything further that you have to say.

One of them (German Commerzbank leader Martin Blessing) doubled his income last year, he got 106.8 MB approximately last year.

Commerzbank was (or still is) supported by German taxpayers, they were actually bankruptct since 2008 - but "too big to fail"

Not saying some managers aren't overpaid, i.e., are being paid out of proportion to their actual contribution to the company due to nepotism, cronyism, corruption, manipulation, or whatever. But that's a REAL long way from an insanely generalized and terminally ignorant statement like "managers are psychopaths". Such a statement says FAR MORE about the person making it and the oversized piece of lumber on his shoulder than about the subject under discussion. If you ask me, managers are no more an overpaid species - much less actually, across the board - than rock stars and other entertainment celebrities, professional athletes, union leaders, and politicians. Since no one takes the other groups to task, I don't pay much attention to the pathetic squawking and screeching about overpaid managers & executives either. It's really pretty close to being all the same, and usually has as much to do with envy and inadequacy as it does with any genuine sense of inequity.

[ramrod45]

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If you ask 301 B for something worth 299 B, there will be no transaction. It's as simple as that. Raising the minimum wage without increasing productivity just leads to higher unemployment. Some will get 60 B more per day, but some will get 300 B less per day.

If you really want to improve the lives of workers you should promote incentives to increase productivity rather than populist and counter-productive measures like a minimum wage. Education, automation, research and development, investment, free trade and competition all help to boost productivity long term.

Your first premise is totally flawed. The worth of the item is determined by the purchaser. Case in point: I enjoy my SangSom. I can buy that in a number of places, including 7-11 for 299 baht, or a little mom and pop place a bit further away for 265 baht. Suppose I really, really want a SangSom and coke. Where do I buy it? Always at the mom and pop? No. Sometimes I run to 7-11 because it is closer to where I live. So factors other than just the "worth" of the product have to be factored in.

I would also debate your second assertion, that any rise in the minimum wage will necessary lead to layoffs. This same argument is consistently trotted out in the US whenever a rise in the minimum wage is proposed. The conservatives use this one every single time, and they have yet to ever provide supporting documentation. Are there some layoffs? Undoubtedly, especially in businesses that are already skating on thin ice. However, overall there has yet to be a net loss of jobs. In fact, most of the states or municipalities that independently boost the minimum wage tend to see job growth due to the increased economic activity that results from the higher wages. Those living on a minimum wage do not save that money, and they do not invest that money. They spend it, immediately. That money goes directly back into the economy and typically increases employment.

Actually, you are flawed in your assertion of the worth of product. If you want your rum and prefer to purchase at 7-11, the "worth" of that product includes price, convenience, location, etc. It is all factored in, as the worth of a product eventually comes down to what you, as a consumer, is, or is not, willing to pay. The Op is actually stating that overpriced commodities will have few purchasers, and at some point, zero purchasers. You stretched his statement out of context, but even then, whichever store you buy your rum from, there is a "worth" to that individual purchase, including pricing. If any one of those "worths" are outside of your convenience, necessity, value, etc., you will choose to purchase elsewhere, or not at all. Perhaps you skipped Econ 101 yourself.

[tullynagardy]

Yingluk kicked inflation into high gear with her vote-buying populist policy BS.

But Yingluck promised every Uni grad a starting salary of 15,000 a month

God you two are so boring. Regardless of the topic you bring up an administration that has long been and gone and has nothing to do with the failures of today. As I`ve said before, it`s like defending your cheating wife by pointing out your previous wife was also unfaithful. Change the record.

For the record halloween, inflation can and does changes from month to month dependent on a huge variety of factors such as interest rates and oil prices. The idea it can be affected by a government that stopped functioning properly at the end of 2013 is ignorant in the extreme, like most of your posts.

[rubl]

Yingluk kicked inflation into high gear with her vote-buying populist policy BS.

But Yingluck promised every Uni grad a starting salary of 15,000 a month

God you two are so boring. Regardless of the topic you bring up an administration that has long been and gone and has nothing to do with the failures of today. As I`ve said before, it`s like defending your cheating wife by pointing out your previous wife was also unfaithful. Change the record.

For the record halloween, inflation can and does changes from month to month dependent on a huge variety of factors such as interest rates and oil prices. The idea it can be affected by a government that stopped functioning properly at the end of 2013 is ignorant in the extreme, like most of your posts.

Well, the topic of "wage debate ignores obscene incomes" could have been called a failure for every government of the last 50 years. That's not really a failure of the current government. Also we still have protests and questions in parliaments in the West about exorbitant high salaries and bonuses, like in the Financial Sector.

Inflation fluctuates and is in part effected by government actions, in part by the global status. The previous government created a spike with their 'must do' pre-election promises even if they stated that price rises were imagination. The current government seems to have to beat off deflation, similar to some Western European countries.

[halloween]

What was being paid in Detract was way above minimum with good benefits too.

For me, the minimum wage should rise by at least inflation every year.

Exactly that policy led me to pay 17% on my home loan not so many (25?) years ago. Remember the south Pacific peso?

A minimum wage policy caused inflation to go to 17%. Yeah right.

Welcome to Fox news economics.

If minimum wages don't go up by at least inflation companies profitability rises at the expense of its labour. And u think that is a good thing. After 97, minimum wages barely rose in Thailand for 7 or 8 years.

And when finally they were increased, companies moaned and bitched. Meanwhile profitability of these firms had increased massively in a decade.

It is the fact that Thai labour has been so cheap for so long that industry in Thailand is where it is. Massively over reliant on volume of bodies.

You may not have been around at the time, but I was. Wages were rising at inflation minimum or more, causing more inflation. It was only when workers were offered benefits OTHER than wage rises, in this case superannuation, that the spiral was broken.

[aussieinthailand]

This is not the issue of how much the Thai worker is worth, this is really about the quality work of the local labor, which is quite crappy, Thai workers in general are not productive as their counterpart in China and VN, in most cases, they're lazy, irresponsible, dishonest and all around disloyal and uninspiring people to work with, hence the law remunerations they get for their mi pen rai attitude, I ought to know, I have employed hundreds of them in my factories both in Bkk and in up country....

Yu'p there are a lot of as you say "mi pen rai" workers out there, but at the same time there is a lot of good people with a good work ethic.

Perhaps instead of laying blame at Thai workers and take a look at the interview process and employment selections, after all isn't that were the employer is supposed to separate the wheat from the chaff? So your "I ought to know" is quite right, just not applied properly as an employer.

Not having a crack just pointing out the obvious elephant in the room.

Cheers mate

Now about wage and living standards, The top end should have salary cap's that's a given in my book, there should be a basic living wage that is not working poor, also a given.

If wagers do go up then there needs to be prior legislation that things like rental must be on a 2 year freeze so as the rich land owners are not scalping the money that was supposed to improve the low income earner which commonly done the world over.

[Thai at Heart]

What was being paid in Detract was way above minimum with good benefits too.

For me, the minimum wage should rise by at least inflation every year.

Exactly that policy led me to pay 17% on my home loan not so many (25?) years ago. Remember the south Pacific peso?

A minimum wage policy caused inflation to go to 17%. Yeah right.

Welcome to Fox news economics.

If minimum wages don't go up by at least inflation companies profitability rises at the expense of its labour. And u think that is a good thing. After 97, minimum wages barely rose in Thailand for 7 or 8 years.

And when finally they were increased, companies moaned and bitched. Meanwhile profitability of these firms had increased massively in a decade.

It is the fact that Thai labour has been so cheap for so long that industry in Thailand is where it is. Massively over reliant on volume of bodies.

You may not have been around at the time, but I was. Wages were rising at inflation minimum or more, causing more inflation. It was only when workers were offered benefits OTHER than wage rises, in this case superannuation, that the spiral was broken.

Comparing the inflationary troubles of a developed nation such as Oz with a developing nation such as Thailand is really, truly, honestly apples and pears. The 300 baht a day increase has been done, absorbed and finished.

They should write it in stone that minimum should go up by inflation. At 4% it represents a grand increase of 12 baht per day. Not per hour by the way. The daily rates in Thailand are akin to hourly in the developed world.

The wage was barely increased for 15 years after 97. It did not keep up, and it can actually be used to force companies to invest in capital goods to increase efficiency in stead of throwing bodies at a problem.

Sorry, but the Thai minimum wage issue has been won by business for too long and the 300 baht issue was nonsense. From my previous employers perspective, it cost them 150k against profits of 10mn usd per year.

A true pittance.