Tax Break

Today the Thai government gave many of its citizens a tax break by reducing the excise tax of diesel fuel by about 4 baht per liter. The results is a gallon of diesel now roughly sells for about $4.55 per gallon rather than $5.02. That’s a pretty good deal for me.

The amazing part of this change in price is the way they went about implementing the new price.

At midnight on Thursday every fuel station in Thailand, all 15,000 of them, plus 100 oil depots closed. They reopen five hours later at 5:00 A.M. on Friday morning. During this time 2000 agents checked the diesel fuel levels in the tanks of all these stations. This was accomplished so that stations could receive a tax refund for the excise tax they had previously paid on the fuel in their stocks.

This may not have been the most cost effective way to accomplish this, but labor is cheap and at least the government did something to ease the fuel price burden upon is citizens. Not like many western countries that talk things to death but do nothing. I for one appreciate the government’s action and even though I am not a citizen I can reap the benefits.

Thai Fact: The average salary for those employed in the field of agriculture is only 3,420 baht per month or about $102.00 per month. These are the good folks who normally work 7 day a week, which works out to something like $3.40 per day. I’m not a religious person, but God bless these folks.