'Minimum daily wage possible at the end of this year to 492 baht to compensate for rising living costs'
The National Wage Committee is expected to come up with a proposal to increase the daily minimum wage due to the rising cost of living in Thailand.
This was stated by Labor Secretary Suchart Chomklin at a press conference. Recently, the Thai Labor Solidarity Commission (TLSC) and the Confederation of Labor Relations of State-owned Enterprises (SERC) asked the government to set the minimum wage for workers at 492 baht per day (€13,30).
According to the Labor Minister, a survey is being conducted from April to June to assess people's cost of living. The outcome of this is expected to be discussed between August and September. If the proposed wage rate is approved, the Department of Labor will submit it to the Cabinet for approval.
The National Wage Commission is made up of representatives from employers, unions and government officials. The government is represented by the Ministry of Labour, while workers and employers are represented by TLSC and SERC and the Employers' Confederation of Thailand.
Source: NNT
Rightly so, for these people.
Maybe not nice for the employers, or for us.
But I have no problem with that.
That it is also more expensive for me
Hans van Mourik
The proposal is nice but will not make it yet. An increase of 49% is not commensurate with the inflation of the last 5 years. However, the signal is that they want to move towards a wage of between 15.000-25.000 baht per month for the average employee in a company and that fits in with what the current government also wants. Government may want to but powerful business decides in TH.
In most multinational companies, employees already have such an amount due to all kinds of allowances and bonuses. Take a look at an industrial site on a job day, you will learn something
But not with the Thai companies and that is where the problem lies
Johnny, due to all sometimes legally required allowances and or extra bonuses, sometimes up to 5 monthly salaries,
do Thai people who work for multinationals or larger Thai companies already have such a monthly salary.
But there are also a lot of day workers, who come when they are needed or sometimes want to, and they are not entitled to the allowances (related to function and attendance), but they are entitled to the bonus.
(Many) Thai small employers and individuals do not mind those rules and pay black / gray and therefore less
A well-known concept in the west and also here the so-called undeclared worker who settles for less and then in NL often in addition to benefits, which they don't have here........
You should go to a recruitment day at a business park for the knowledge, that opens your eyes .... not sarcastically meant by the way
492 bath per day okay, but that leaves a lot of uncertainty: how much is that per hour or per month? How long is the working day in Thailand? Officially and in reality? How many working days per week?
6 days a week, 8 hours a day
Any hour beyond that is Overtime
A wanted and given thing in Thailand
If you as an employer do not offer OT, you have less chance of applicants
According to Thai logic, 30x the daily wage is the minimum wage and the employer must give at least 4 paid days off per month. In Bangkok, that means that 9930 baht is the minimum monthly wage and that would then be 14.760 baht. About the same as the salary for a fresh out of college. It is up to the employer whether they want the staff to work 48 hours a week and to the employee to accept it if 48 hours have to be worked. Market forces show that often the unskilled work longer for less pay and that studying (possibly with taking out a student loan) can contribute to a reasonable life because I can assume that graduates will also ask for a higher starting wage. In short, life will become more expensive because production will not increase.
Would be great news for many people were it not for the use of Burmese, Cambodians and Laotians who come to work for much less.
For a long time I have been annoyed by compatriots who proudly say that they employ a gardener from Burma for THB 3000,- P/M.
It is well known that many employers in Thailand are anti-social, but let us at least set a good example and reward good work well.
That's right, Geert, it bothers me too. We have a cleaning lady from Myanmar, she earns 400 baht a day, which is well paid in our province. Give that every day with great pleasure. Hard worker, reliable and loyal, for years. A Thai cleaning lady, that's what we're fed up with here, most don't really want to work, but they do want to earn, and even if you pay well, they come up with an excuse after a few days. (mind you, that is our personal limited experience) Many Myanmar staff are treated like slaves here, with us in fishing, fruit growing and construction, I have a very hard time with that, and then I'm not even talking about the racism that they have to deal with!
Of course, 12 to 15000 Baht per month is a meager wage. However, a wage of 60.000 Baht in the west is too. It should not be forgotten that daily life in Thailand is also 3 to 4 times cheaper in the general sense.
Anyone in the west who has to live on 1500 euros a month and has no property or financial reserves can only survive.
And that rising minimum wage is of course passed on to the customer. Living costs are rising again and the circle is complete again.
Once upon a time we in the low countries had just as low wages as now in Thailand Stan.
Thanks to prosperity and inflation correction, we are now at the current salary level.
What do you prefer: the wages of the time, comparable to the current minimum wages in TH, or the current minimum wages in the low countries?
Personally, I think we are many times (8 to 10 times?) better off.
Don't forget the cost of living back then when we only earned 30 or 40 guilders a day.
Yes, we are better off than we were then. But 8 to 10 times?
Not entirely correct Geert and certainly not for the registered and mainly foreign companies/owners
These immigrant workers can come under the MOU, but they are offered the same working conditions as the Thai.
And if you hear or read about companies that don't then it's small Thai companies or the farang you're talking about, but the registered foreign immigrant worker has the same rights and obligations as a Thai… also in the social field
Another joke from this government. which many Thais have their fill of.
That is only laughed at. Big Joke and Rambo Esan are now going to tackle the lottery: 80Bht is the prize and the black lottery should be abolished.
I'll definitely give those two a shot.
The illegal Burmese don't get the 150Bht a day here and the H.Hermandad takes half of that at the end of the day!
It all seems nice, but more than half of the working Thai population does not work on a contract, not per month and not per day, but in Dutch terms they are self-employed. The minimum wage does not apply to this, apart from the fact that payment of the minimum wage is not complied with and is not monitored or punished.
Chris, may we know the source of your information??
Labor population is 38 million of which 33% in the agricultural sector. 54% is work in the informal sector. Source: World Bank, 2019 figures.
How searched: Google, for example type in: working population Thailand
This proposal then concerns the highest minimum wage, right? Since a 2018 there are ten different minimum wage limits. In Bangkok, that amount is currently 336 baht, in the far south 313 baht. Increasing that is of course a nice signal, but not the solution. After all, companies can partly or fully pass on extra wage costs in their prices, to the point where it threatens to damage their own competitive position. And it doesn't detract from the fact that Thailand is in the top of the world's most unequal countries.
For more structural solutions I would also focus on stronger trade unions, more transparency (for companies and government). The ordinary Thai must have more influence on daily life. The workplace, where people spend roughly 1/3 of their time, would benefit from a democratic workplace. If everyone who works somewhere really has co-determination, co-responsibility, co-ownership. Let the employees determine together what a decent wage is, what part of the turnover goes to reinvestment, etc. A first step would simply be to vote together on wages, that people with exceptional skills are properly compensated for this seems to me something that the most employees will agree, but if people in the company receive tens to hundreds of times more money in their hands, while the standard employee earns next to nothing, that cannot be justified, can it?
More influence, more say, more democracy, less inequality. Structural reforms. That will make work really pay and people will get a decent wage and less worry about the daily burdens and a little normal social existence.
Well, that wouldn't just be fantastic in Thailand. Also in the Netherlands (and probably every country in the world. Employees get more pay and those gigantic bonuses for the managers are gone.
Guess the votes counted quickly. 🙂
Dear Rob,
You forget that there are many job hoppers who don't give a damn how a company is doing. Not surprising with the trend that you don't work for a boss for 40 years and knowing that why should you give runaways a say? The reward should be for the stayers in the form of wages and profit certificates.