According to Michael Spence’s The Next Convergence Thailand is one of only 13 developing countries that have “managed to grow for twenty-five years or more at an average rate of 7 percent of more” (54). Thailand achieved this between 1960 and 1997. As the graph (below) of Thailand’s annual GDP growth rate shows, both the Asias financial crisis and the GFC sent the Thai economy backwards but healthy growth rates were quickly resumed.