An economy growing at an average of 7% per year will double in size in about 10 years. At this rate Thailand will have moved into the World Bank’s high income category in less than 20 years. Economic growth isn’t everything, and some will point to the social, environmental and cultural costs of Thailand’s modern transformation. But let’s not lose signs of some of Thailand’s great successes, despite some of the obvious failings in its political system:
• In 1988 the poverty rate (using Thailand’s poverty line) was 42 percent; in 2009 it was about 8 percent.
• In 1960, one in seven children died before reaching the age of five. In other words, most parents (especially in rural Thailand) experienced holding held a dead child in their arms. In 2009 the rate was about one in 77.
• Over the same period life expectancy at birth has increased 14 years for men and 16 years for women. (All data are from here.)