Effective January 1, 2017, most provinces in Thailand will see a modest increase in the daily minimum wage.  There has been some controversy over the setting of Thailand’s minimum wage following a move to a national minimum wage of 300 THB a few years ago, with the business community claiming that such a national minimum wage reduced Thailand’s competitiveness and gave some workers in rural provinces a significant pay increase.

The new changes result from consideration by the Wage Committee of proposals from each of the Provincial Wage Committees concerning the cost of living for each of Thailand’s provinces.   The changes are modest, ranging in a minimum wage of 310 THB in Bangkok, Phuket and other industrialized provinces, with most other provinces seeing an increase to 308 THB and 305 THB.  A few rural provinces (Chumphon, Trang, Nakhon Si Thammarat, Narathiwat, Pattani, Yala, Ranong and Sing Buri) will not see any change in the minimum wage.