More public holidays eyed in bid to boost economy

[Surasak]

2 hours ago, Crusader said:

...and to think that the people who come up with these ridiculous suggestions are all getting paid for doing so...and some of them probably pretty well paid too.

What else can you expect? They get paid on productivity, the more <deleted> they produce the better paid they are.

[ThailandRyan]

18 minutes ago, Yinn said:

Hmmm. 

What “real world”? 

 

What your country known for?

Not for creating holidays so the economy can supposedly get a boost from workers who have little money or who are unemployed @Yinn

[Andrew65]

If you're a business owner and over recent months have had to close your business (by order of the Gvt), the last thing you'll want/need to do is give your staff more paid time off.

[fred110]

4 hours ago, Keyser Soze666 said:

What a ridiculous country this is. Little wonder in the real world it is only known for spicy food and lady boys.

And hookers.

[Rockbottom]

Quote

The idea was first proposed by Prime Minister Prayut Chan-o-cha.

Hmmmm...he must have had another brain cramp that day because this is a ludicrous proposition.

[Thomas J]

5 hours ago, webfact said:

The Tourism and Sports Ministry is looking into the option of creating new public holidays in a bid to stimulate the economy

The government puts an absolute strangle hold on the economy. Then attempts to resuscitate it with actions that would have an insignificant impact.  Does it not strike these people that locals do not visit the tourist attractions or stay in anywhere's near the number of foreign tourists.  Additionally, a substantial number of Thai's even with the time off would not have the financial resources to vacation.  I think the government may be suffering from Munchausen Syndrome By Proxy 

[Whip]

I'll go all-in on that!

[RocketDog]

5 hours ago, Raphael Hythlodaeus said:

If public holidays stimulated the economy, then I suggest cancelling work-days indefinitely.

Yeah but.......they kinda already did that which is what got us to where we are now. 

Any other ideas? 

[Andrew65]

2 hours ago, SpanishExpat said:

That’s one of the reasons why Thailand will never be a 1st world country, along with ones like Japan or South Korea! I remember the governments funny vision pre-covid to become a high income country within the next 10 yrs!???? The Thai “chivid sanook” mindset may be chilling (and I enjoy it, as I am not dependent on their economy), but it’s disastrous for their competitiveness.

Also, Thailand has over-employment, they employ 3 or 4 people to do what 1 or 2 people would be doing in the West. I suppose low wages make that more do-able.

[Raphus]

I am actually lost for words !!

Just don’t know how to reply to this madness

[djayz]

There was an article on here a day or two ago along the lines of how those in the low income bracket are going to boost spending. Now, they're playing with the idea of more holidays (fine by me), but where are these people going to get the money for more holidays? More trips? More spending? So many of them are strugglling as it is. I fail to understand where this money is coming from. 

[KKr]

6 hours ago, webfact said:

looking into the option of creating new public holidays in a bid to stimulate the economy,

so the math will be like :
less time on the job salaried occupation thus lower GDP but less lower tourism spending = higher spending percentage.

Brilliant !

Also the Balance of Payments will improve because lower income means less buying power for imported goods. Moreover, those foreign tourists only brought in 13 (or now reportedly 20 already) % or so of GDP so never mind

[KKr]

26 minutes ago, djayz said:

There was an article on here a day or two ago along the lines of how those in the low income bracket are going to boost spending. Now, they're playing with the idea of more holidays (fine by me), but where are these people going to get the money for more holidays? More trips? More spending? So many of them are strugglling as it is. I fail to understand where this money is coming from. 

maybe if salaries indeed are cut or postponed as is now rumoured, since the coffers are apparently empty, the situation will significantly improve (pun intended)

[Miami007]

Less work will stimulate the economy?

Sure, why not.. if everyone doesn't work at all, the economy should be great according to that logic.....

 

And the money to support all Thai residents grows on trees. A true paradise

[thailand49]

The reason the leaders like this continue to come up with silly hair brain ideas that man people laugh is Thailand has already too many holidays take that with a public school system that just go through the motion the result you get leaders like this with ideas just like the leaders!

[Damrongsak]

2 hours ago, dogfish180 said:

What a great idea. Let's recirculate the same money.

 

Thomas Edison figured that out:  Edison's greatest achievement came in 1879 when he invented the electric company. Edison's design was a brilliant adaptation of the simple electrical circuit. The electric company sends the electricity through a wire to the customer, then immediately gets the electricity back through another wire. Then (this is the brilliant part) they send it right back to the customer again. This means that the electric company can sell a customer the same batch of electricity thousands of times a day and never get caught, since very few customers take the time to examine their electricity very closely. In fact, the last year any NEW electricity was generated was 1937.

[Don Mega]

They could another 100 if they like, our company outlined in December last year what this years public holidays, the calendar was set would be and thats what we get.... with the Songkran ones now allocated to December.

Edited September 15, 2020 by Don Mega

[hugocnx]

5 hours ago, IamNoone88 said:

Interesting, the UK and US are pushing "get back to work to kick start the economy" and Thailand is pushing "more holidays to kick start the economy". 

Moreover the people who got hurt by the lock down are now supposed to pay to get the economy going? 

 

[herfiehandbag]

7 hours ago, Raphael Hythlodaeus said:

If public holidays stimulated the economy, then I suggest cancelling work-days indefinitely.

For quite a significant proportion of the population, especially those who worked in the tourist industry (and no I don't just mean girls who worked in bars) that has already happened!

[thairookie]

7 hours ago, JusticeGB said:

Another day and another stupid idea from the Minister of non Tourism. Maybe he should realise that all these public holidays are damaging to businesses and the weak economy. 

They had civil servants in mind.  After all, only civil servants are not affected by the economic damage brought about by Wuhan virus.

[Don Mega]

2 minutes ago, thairookie said:

They had civil servants in mind.  After all, only civil servants are not affected by the economic damage brought about by Wuhan virus.

Iam not civil servant and this WuFlu has not affected me or the company I work for, we are not in the minority.

[sbf]

I have an involvement with a firm which exports a perishable high value product to Europe every weekend. It must be available for our European customers to clear in Europe on Monday morning. These last few months have been incredibly difficult with the flight cancellations etc etc. We have had  a few times where we just could not get any flight availability and therefore we could not export. Our customer has been understanding at these times of course. 

Our product is licenced by the Thai government and needs to be cleared by government inspectors who are normally present at the main airports 24/7, before undergoing customs clearance in order to leave. On the recent 4 day holiday, we were told by the government office responsible for the inspection that they would not be working at all for the 4 days of the holiday finishing on Thursday evening and restarting on Tuesday. We received this news late Wednesday afternoon, and we just did not have the time to make another shipping arrangement for our product to leave on Thursday. We emailed our customer explaining the circumstances, and did not receive a response immediately which was a little disconcerting. They have now emailed reducing our order to 25% of what it has been for more than 25 years. Many millions of baht will be lost to Thailand in export earnings from this one small business alone. We will have to lay off 7-8 staff unless we can get things to revert to where they were or find other markets. I hope the civil servant enjoyed his holiday. 

[phetphet]

Here in Samui, November is the wettest month of the year. Can't see many people coming here for a getaway.

The last long weekend here was quite busy, but it was hot and dry.

 

I would imagine many Thais take advantage of a long weekend to go home and visit family.

[herfiehandbag]

5 minutes ago, phetphet said:

 

I would imagine many Thais take advantage of a long weekend to go home and visit family.

Many have already "gone back to their farms".

 

They are at home and living with their families.

[josephbloggs]

7 hours ago, The Barmbeker said:

This is the one and only plan they have: more public- holidays!

Pathetic, really!

It's easy to mock, and I agree it does sound stupid on the face of it, but think a little harder.  Consider Thailand is heavily reliant on tourism and tourism has essentially disappeared.  Also consider the Government will have historic data on what happens to the local economies when there is a holiday and people move around the country.  If it does show it's a stimulus to local regions then it is a benefit.  If it doesn't then they wouldn't do it - the data exists.  I am sure many local businesses benefit.

Easier to just blindly mock / bash though.

Edited September 15, 2020 by josephbloggs

[Caldera]

Boost the economy by killing productivity? I guess you have to be Thai to find that convincing!

 

[frontier9]

I wonder if they would consider making farangs ambassadors to tell other farangs to visit. Maybe they might realize that by treating us roughly we may have a less than rosy story to tell a prospective long stay tourist. I want to help the country but they need to understand this idea that one negative report will spread to many potential customers and so every farang they grief has a network they might actually try to stop from coming. For whatever reason ... its a more coherent argument than some of the more obvious ones like "we are here spending money". There seems to be some kind of "sure, we want to see that you are spending" - which also doesn't work. You can just not spend and save harder to meet the security deposit terms - well done, you've disincentivized locals from spending their money. Just some kind of economic lecture ...

 

I don't begrudge them wanting to monitor and control visitors because it is after all what everyone does to asians in other parts of the world. Its kind of understood most of the time that if people have no money they will seek work - so i understand that it relates to protecting local jobs. However, you can always police that by actual detective work ... perhaps. I accept I could be wrong ... the thing is that jobs are a market. If you let the market be open you'll stimulate business and become a kind of business center and tourism is an analogue of that.

 

I have friends, Thai's who are looking to buy a home. I was thinking of warning them - you might like to rent a while, why? Sellers vs buyers may crash the market ... do they think about that as a kind of scenario. If people locked up immense amounts speculating real estate and you stop people from coming and buying it ... CRASH. Foresight required.

[SiSePuede419]

More profit for Beer Billionaires, yay!

 

[SiSePuede419]

1 hour ago, Don Mega said:

WuFlu has not affected me

How do you know you don't have heart damage from COVID-19?!?!? ????

 

COVID-19 Can Wreck Your Heart, Even if You Haven’t Had Any Symptoms

 

 

 

 

 

[GAZZPA]

7 hours ago, ajarnmarc said:

For the Citizens it often appears they have noted this suggestion. When I ask personnel working, they always seem to come from a neighboring country. Often seems hard to find Thai Citizens working in common labor positions. I think this has contributed to the down slide of hospitality within the country. Not saying the neighboring countries labor is poor, it's just doesn't carry the same soul that was once present within the nation; in 2000. We often assume they are Thai citizens, yet when asked they are not in most cases. Turns out Thai Citizens opt for the paid application positions, in the upper management or government slots. 100-200k and they get an application to apply, along with their University docs, they are set with a position for their remaining working years. 

Sorry but you are out of touch,, the vast majority of Thai people do not have degrees or any kind of decent training or education. There are millions of Thai people working in the service industry and labour positions, most of my staff were Thai. I had a lot of issues with unreliability and they were not loyal workers. After payday it was very common for the Thai workers to take time off until they wanted money again. In short I think the Thai work ethic in the entry level to be very poor indeed, certainly didn't see any kind of "soul". I had far better staff in Hong Kong, China, Taiwan, Vietnam, Myanmar and Cambodia. I was working in manufacturing hence the exposure to so many different countries.