0.56 percent. That's Thailand's official unemployment rate as of end-2014. It's among the lowest in the world, and compares with 9.4 percent in India and 6 percent in the Philippines in the region.
This is not a recent phenomenon: Thailand's jobless rate has held below 1 percent for the most part since 2011. The record high was 5.73 percent in Jan. 2001, when the National Statistical Office first began releasing the data every month. How did it get so low?
"Our unemployment rate has been low not because of a different definition from other countries, but because of structural problems,'' said Bank of Thailand spokesman Chirathep Senivongs Na Ayudhya. "The agricultural sector absorbs laborers and those who can't find work can always look for jobs in the informal sector or do something on their own.''