ABSTRACT
The impact of globalisation, the liberalisation of the financial market, economic restructuring, and technological advances have all contributed to changes in the pattern of employment in Thailand over the past two decades. Economic restructuring transformed Thailand from an agrarian economy into an exportoriented industrialising nation. The main driving force behind this rapid transition was the boom in manufacturing exports in the 1990s. During the period between 1985 and 1995, Thailand’s average GDP growth rate was 8 per cent per annum, making it one of the fastest growing economies in the world (Phongpaichit 2000). As manufacturing exports increased, demand for urban labour exceeded supply. As a consequence, the country encountered not only a shortage of skilled labour, but also a surplus of unskilled workers. The emerging structural unemployment therefore remains a challenge facing the Thai government.
