An Evaluation of the Thai Government Performance along Thailand’s Economic Path and in Response to the Crisis.
The Thai governments had not done a very good job. They had not dared to be far-sighted as they were still concerned much about politics. They had stuck to the goal held since the first time of capital account liberalization, a goal which had aimed at the expansion of the economy. The economy did expand, however, not quite healthily. It was like a bubble, continuously inflated, but the bigger it became, the more easily it would explode even with a soft touch of a rough surface.
The liberalization of the financial sector had been proved to be too reckless. Statistics such as ratio of foreign liabilities to foreign assets, non-performing loans, contribution of inward FDI to current account financing, had been evidences of the recklessness. However, even a good statistics like high GDP growth could not have made the economy joyful. Thailand’s GDP growth had been high at around 8.5% during the first half of 1990s. Nevertheless, a large contribution of the growth had come from production of non-tradable good and from pure speculative capital inflow. The structure of the Thai economy was still not ready for that large amount of capital not to be used in real investment. If Thailand had run current account surplus and balance of trade surplus as high as that of Taiwan or Singapore (table9 and table 10), it might have a reason and want to liberate itself that much in the financial world.
Politics seemed to be much influential in policy making of the government. The majority of Thai people who walked on the street had been made to see only a prosper side of the economy. It had only been shown to them the growing of the cities and business sectors, and statistics such as high GDP growth, high saving rate, government fiscal balance surpluses, high volume of exports, a claim that Thailand had become one of the Asian Tigers. But it had not been shown to them how serious the country had become indebted, and how recklessly capital had been transferred and used in the economy. Thai people should be better informed and made sophisticated. The Thai government had tried to maintain its popularity even in the last minute when it decided not to ask IMF for a rescue package immediately after the devaluation of the baht was announced, but waited until 26 days later to eventually called in the IMF. This delay had a serious consequence as it exacerbated the situation of bank run. According to Frederic S. Mishkin, it was believed that the faster the lending was done, the lower was the amount that actually had to be lent.[3] The action of the government, thus, was highly disadvantageous to the economy. Whereas the US Federal Reserve Bank could engage in a lender of last resort operation in a day in the event of stock market crash of 1987, the Bank of Thailand had postponed for another 26 days before it engaged in a lending operation.
Another government conduct worth to be discussed was its loose monetary policy during the period right after the first devaluation of the baht. Committing to that policy, the government showed its steadfast attempt to promote the production and thus the growth of the economy, an objective which had never been set aside. It had kept interest rate low so that the amount of money supply in the economy would be high which would encourage domestic consumption and investment. This conformed to the ‘Laffer curve’ condition saying that a fall not a rise of interest rate would have strengthen the economy and restored confidence. Unfortunately, the problem of bank panic was so serious that no matter how much money supply the economy had, the creditors would attempt their best to take money out of the system and did not invest. This resulted in a continuous spiral of currency depreciation that dramatically increased the real burden of the foreign-currency liabilities. Seeing that a loose monetary did not work, the government later on had switched to tighten its monetary policy. It raised domestic interest rate, hoping to retain money in the system. However, the policy turned out to be propelling a more serious contraction of the Thai economy and credit crunch.