The intimate and warm relationship between customer and shopkeeper, and sense of community has also disappeared with this new phenomenon. In its place are brightly-lit neon hyper stores, which while luxurious and comfortable, lack the human touch of familiar faced shop-owners. Throughout the nation, the livelihood of the owners of these family-run stores has been taken away, and profits accumulated with a few large chains and franchises. Shop owners who previously ran their own businesses have no option but to become employees of these large corporations instead. This situation has arisen because we have opened our society to Western culture and influence. We have stood by and watched small, family-run shops fight a battle against the large chain stores with incomparable financial standing – a battle they are sure to lose. If authorities recognize the importance of the distribution of income as well as the distribution of opportunities, these family-run businesses would be able to continue with their livelihoods, and large multinational corporations could be prevented from overwhelming these small businesses. The process of globalization will bring about access to new technologies, which will help improve the efficiency of our various economic sectors. But in the meantime, the process of globalization opens our economy to the possibility of large multinational corporations taking over local businesses. We should welcome globalization in as much as it helps us enhance efficiency, reduce costs, and improve competitiveness, in the business which has to compete in the international arena.
Not surprisingly, the “save now, pay later” culture has been reversed. In the United States, the “pay now, save later” culture has worked for the US economy, as people have better job opportunities. We should not promote such culture in our economy because generally people, especially those in the provinces, cannot easily earn extra income to pay for their increased debt burdens. This is why I try to tell people that we should not adopt the Western way of “pay now, save later” mentality too rapidly, or allow this mentality to become a norm in our society; otherwise a host of problems would arise. Credit card and personal loan business still have benefits for consumers in terms of their convenience, particularly for those customers who have financial literacy and self-control. However, there is a need to control and supervise this business to prevent retail customers from overspending and, at the same time, prevent the operators from overcharging interest rates and fees. Ladies and Gentlemen, Let me bring you to the second issue that concerns me even more than the change in value placed on our saving culture. Recently I notice that business and economy are putting greater emphasis on size and growth. People get excited with large investment projects; such as the newly opened 12 billion baht shopping complex. People admire big businesses with large earnings and profits, and businesses that achieve high rates of growth and expansion.