Employment options for young men in Surin

Mel Malinowski said:
I’m trying to help a relative who dropped school at 14 and now is facing how to earn a decent living without any marketable skills. That seems to yield about ฿500 a day max in Surin, hardly enough to support a family. I’m willing to fund training for him if he wants better. Do jobs such as electrician, plumber or motorcycle/auto mechanic earn better? (They do in USA). Is such trade education available and cost-effective? Currently, university grads are having trouble finding jobs.
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So what has he been doing since dropping out of school at age 14? How old now? What experience has he gained in the employment area?

500 baht a day is decent money for a school drop out with no experience or training. (What is the minimum wage these days here? 300 baht?)

"hardly enough to support a family" Many do on that, very many. Depends on how they live, where they live, and if wife works as well. Depends on how many kids they pop out as well and how they spend and/or save.

"Do jobs such as electrician, plumber or motorcycle/auto mechanic earn better?" Of course they do, especially if they know their shite, have degrees and are certified. But I doubt his math skills are very good if he dropped out of school at 14. So forget electrician, you need the math, at least in the states, to become a licensed 'journeyman'. (And if you see the electrical work being done around here you'll realize why.) Seems to be a need for Air Con and Refrigeration skills. I am pretty sure the tech schools here have courses, maybe night courses? What does HE feel he'd like to try and do? Realistically. Any skills at all? Mechanic? There's always a need for good mechanics here. Surin Tech school has courses I believe. A nephew of ours did that here in Surin. Is he computer savvy?

Associate and BS degrees are a dime a dozen here. Even 7-11 wants their workers to have a BS degree. LOL

What is he wired for? What's his passion? What can he do realistically and is he disciplined enough to go back to school and learn a trade? Could he be an apprentice for a few years and learn 'on the job' in some trade?

Just my thoughts.
 
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gotlost said:
My wife son quite school after grade 9. His uncle took him under his wing. He is now 26 years old happily married with a daughter and makes a average of 60,000 bath a month sometimes more. He is a crane operator and has CDL.
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There is no reason to question GL's comment. Crane operators in Thailand are well paid.

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gotlost said:
The first year they sent him to an electrical school. The they sent him to a CRAIN SCHOOL. At age of 22 he applied for his CDL and passed the written test and the driving test on his first try.
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Interesting idea. My dad was an ‘operating engineer’, and I started operating as soon as I could reach the pedals, and did till I went off to college. The problem, I suspect, is getting your first job. It’s like being a pilot: nobody wants to hire you till you are experienced. I‘ve considered setting him up with a 10 CM dump truck, but I suspect that, like in the USA, it’s hard to turn a profit trucking. One of our neighbors is a big excavating contractor, but that requires lots of equipment, and his lead operator with 20 years experience is so good no kid could compete with him. I certainly couldn’t. Where is that crane school? Some trade schools here are virtually scams with few work opportunities post-grad. Is that true here?
 
Cent said:
So what has he been doing since dropping out of school at age 14? How old now? What experience has he gained in the employment area?

500 baht a day is decent money for a school drop out with no experience or training. (What is the minimum wage these days here? 300 baht?)

"hardly enough to support a family" Many do on that, very many. Depends on how they live, where they live, and if wife works as well. Depends on how many kids they pop out as well and how they spend and/or save.

"Do jobs such as electrician, plumber or motorcycle/auto mechanic earn better?" Of course they do, especially if they know their shite, have degrees and are certified. But I doubt his math skills are very good if he dropped out of school at 14. So forget electrician, you need the math, at least in the states, to become a licensed 'journeyman'. (And if you see the electrical work being done around here you'll realize why.) Seems to be a need for Air Con and Refrigeration skills. I am pretty sure the tech schools here have courses, maybe night courses? What does HE feel he'd like to try and do? Realistically. Any skills at all? Mechanic? There's always a need for good mechanics here. Surin Tech school has courses I believe. A nephew of ours did that here in Surin. Is he computer savvy?

Associate and BS degrees are a dime a dozen here. Even 7-11 wants their workers to have a BS degree. LOL

What is he wired for? What's his passion? What can he do realistically and is he disciplined enough to go back to school and learn a trade? Could he be an apprentice for a few years and learn 'on the job' in some trade?

Just my thoughts.
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Good questions, Cent. I’m arriving back in 10 days and will try to find the answers. His mom is pretty smart, so math might be OK
(math is one of my strong points, I can judge/teach). It really depends on how much he learned in school. All you need for trade jobs is basic algebra and some geometry. Trig and calculus/differential equations are pointless unless you’re an engineer. All the kids these days are computer users, but most can’t code. That’s a waste of time, anyway, as it’s mostly being done now by low wage workers in India! I now just do it for fun. The real question is whether he’s willing to accept that there is no way to earn a good living unless you gain a skill people are willing to pay you for.
 
Yorky said:
Nor necessarily.
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It depends on your lifestyle and family obligations, of course. I’m going to test switching from ฿800,000 on deposit to ฿65,000/month this year. It’s wacky that it seems to have to be every single month rather than the equivalent, ฿780,000 a year, which I’ve exceeded every year. The big question is whether they’ll start enforcing the useless health insurance requirement. That might force us to switch to ‘marriage visa’, which has seemed difficult. We can’t seem to satisfy them that our official USA marriage certificate is legal.
 
Mel Malinowski said:
It depends on your lifestyle and family obligations, of course. I’m going to test switching from ฿800,000 on deposit to ฿65,000/month this year. It’s wacky that it seems to have to be every single month rather than the equivalent, ฿780,000 a year, which I’ve exceeded every year. The big question is whether they’ll start enforcing the useless health insurance requirement. That might force us to switch to ‘marriage visa’, which has seemed difficult. We can’t seem to satisfy them that our official USA marriage certificate is legal.
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For a reason that escapes me the health insurance requirement is only (at the present time) applicable for O-A visa holders (plus maybe other unusual ones). Non immigrant O visa holders don't need it for immigration purposes.
 
Mel Malinowski said:
It depends on your lifestyle and family obligations, of course. I’m going to test switching from ฿800,000 on deposit to ฿65,000/month this year. It’s wacky that it seems to have to be every single month rather than the equivalent, ฿780,000 a year, which I’ve exceeded every year. The big question is whether they’ll start enforcing the useless health insurance requirement. That might force us to switch to ‘marriage visa’, which has seemed difficult. We can’t seem to satisfy them that our official USA marriage certificate is legal.
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Have you had the marriage license translated to Thai?
 
Mel Malinowski said:
It depends on your lifestyle and family obligations, of course. I’m going to test switching from ฿800,000 on deposit to ฿65,000/month this year. It’s wacky that it seems to have to be every single month rather than the equivalent, ฿780,000 a year, which I’ve exceeded every year. The big question is whether they’ll start enforcing the useless health insurance requirement. That might force us to switch to ‘marriage visa’, which has seemed difficult. We can’t seem to satisfy them that our official USA marriage certificate is legal.
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it used to be 65k per month or 800k per year. It got changed to 65k each and every month, preferably the same day every month.

Even better if you are switching from 800k to 65k per month, you have to satisfy BOTH criteria. I did it this year; first they check that you have complied with the terms of last year’s approval ie 800k for 5 months and not dropping under 400k after that. Then you have to evidence 12 x 65k monthly receipts. At Jomtien a bank letter and 12 months bank statements (supported by 12 WISE PDFs corresponding to each transfer) were not sufficient - I had to go to Kasikorn bank in central Pattaya to get a special declaration signed confirming the 12 international payments.

Hopefully, @nomad97 will confirm that Surin immigration are not so strict.
 
CO-CO said:
it used to be 65k per month or 800k per year. It got changed to 65k each and every month, preferably the same day every month.

Even better if you are switching from 800k to 65k per month, you have to satisfy BOTH criteria. I did it this year; first they check that you have complied with the terms of last year’s approval ie 800k for 5 months and not dropping under 400k after that. Then you have to evidence 12 x 65k monthly receipts. At Jomtien a bank letter and 12 months bank statements (supported by 12 WISE PDFs corresponding to each transfer) were not sufficient - I had to go to Kasikorn bank in central Pattaya to get a special declaration signed confirming the 12 international payments.

Hopefully, @nomad97 will confirm that Surin immigration are not so strict.
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I think they are as strict as they need to be. Yes, I need the 12 x 65k+ monthly receipts (confirmed by the 12-month Bank Statement for the previous 12 months), the Letter from the bank manager confirming the balance in the Bank Book, (same day as the application), and in my case, as supporting evidence that my income comes from overseas each month, confirmation from each of my 3 pension providers that I receive the monies shown from overseas. My pension providers provide a statement of account each April that clearly show how much is paid to me each month. The fact that the pension statements run from 6th April to 5th April and the bank statement runs from 1st December to 30th November means there is a small imbalance in the yearly amount transferred. This has not been a problem with Surin Immigration for the past 3 years.
 
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