Tea Money & Corruption

Tea Money & Corruption

Posted by Tawan , Reader : 217 , 17:58:19
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With so many blogs on corruption, I want to give it a try.

Tea money is an optional service bonus. Unfortunately, it is still viewed in the West as corruption. As everyone knows in Thailand salaries both government and private are a mathematical impossibility to live on much less raising a family especially in a Global economy where commodity prices increase on a daily basis, oil for example, that no longer follows the law of supply and demand but prices are determined by speculators in the commodities futures market. So the Asian example of tea money is a democratic method of increasing tax free disposable income that is open to all citizens and even foreigners what could be more democratic than that.
A simple example, to get a much needed document a foreigner expecting to receive service at a fraction of the cost compared to a western country is free to pay or stand in line for several days just like everyone else or pays tea money and is in and out in 5 minutes. Paying customers are always serviced first basic business sense.

Another Asian example, a rookie policeman salary 4,500 baht stops a driver and smells alcohol on the driver’s breath. Option one you can go to jail and then through the legal process. Option two you can pay for the policeman’s children lunch and go home.

Westerners seems to be the most upset with tea money even though they may receive benefits from it maybe because tea money has long disappeared in their society given their income levels. As long as there is global income disparity, Asian tea money countries that offer services at Wal Mart prices whether it is a government employee police officer’s 4,500 baht monthly salary or private employee university Accountant graduate with a monthly salary of 7,000 baht “Always Low Prices” will always be in demand.

In a society with no tea money option, the city of Seattle for example, a rookie policeman with a salary of $45,000 US dollars per year will put you in Jail. The legal process can be lengthy and expensive to pay for the legal infrastructure and the government’s huge payroll being America’s number one employer. A DUI Driving under the influence will cost about $7,500 US dollars from a cheap lawyer which may include Jail time or picking up trash on the side of the road and losing the right to drive at least doubling of your auto insurance and possibly losing your job depending on past offenses because information is kept in database forever and ever. The chances of the above happening are pretty certain if you can not afford a lawyer and a public defender is assigned your case. Since there is no corruption in Seattle and if you are someone with money you have the undemocratic option of legalized corruption. In this case you can hire the best lawyer who will prescreen and profile the jury members to make certain you are found innocent a very expensive option but legalized corruption is very expensive in a western country ruled by law.
Now if the policeman’s salary in Seattle was 4,500 baht per month as in an Asian country he might be tempted for tea money who knows. But that would destroy the benefits and the infrastructure of having legalized corruption.

Several years ago a very successful legalized corruption example involving the financial industry came to be born. The banking industry needed to improve its bottom line. Writing checks at that time in America was very popular because of float time you could write a check and have several days to cover the check with a deposit by the time the check cleared the system. So the banking industry hired lobbyist in Washington for EDP Electronic Deposit Processing. With this new law all the bank needed was a scan image of the check and the funds would be debit immediately creating millions of dollars in bounce check fees without even going to the bank the image of the check could be scan as soon as it was written. The banks also still held deposits made for several days before crediting the account increasing even more the chances of a check bouncing and the banks made millions of course legally.

It is important for corrupt Asian countries to notice the difference and procedures required. The US Banks did not implement the EDP system first that would have been classified as corruption they first made the system legal by using lobbyist to get politicians to pass legislation first. So if corrupt Asian countries want to join the world ranks of corrupt legalized nations make sure the legislation is done first. If done carefully corruption charges can never be filed because any act is first legalized,
How much progress has emerging corrupt Asian governments made so far in becoming legalized corrupt developed countries? The progress can be seen in up and coming high profile cases in the judiciary system.