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As the title of this video suggests, we are discussing CESA and to be clear what that is is the Center for Economic Situation Administration. I am kind of making this video, it is kind of one of my opinion videos but I am not asking this simply to be contrarian. I really genuinely am curious as to the answer to this question. Do we really need this thing, honestly? 

Well this is actually a relatively old article from the Phuket News, that is thephuketnews.com, and the article is titled: Government Launches Center for Economic Situation Administration. Quoting directly: "Bangkok: another Government backed center has been established for the purpose of managing an economy rattled by the pandemic crisis with redundancy and business interests as the core qualms expressed over the move." Quoting further: "The Cabinet last Thursday, August 23rd, gave the green light to establish a center to handle the country's economic rehabilitation from the Coronavirus crisis." 

Well, as I have discussed in other videos I would argue, the pandemic crisis it is not so much the issue, it is more the response crisis where we have just had these massive Draconian lockdowns which just really substantially hobbled the economy to begin with. That is arguably where these problems began. The question is, okay we have done the CCSA which is sort of and I have discussed this. I have my own reservations about the need for the CCSA on many different levels but on this one, I really am curious. Is this going to be permanent? Why do we have this? This Center for Economic Situation Administration. Just to quote again: "Another Government backed Center has been established for the purpose of managing an economy rattled by the pandemic crisis with redundancy in business interests as the core qualms expressed over the move." Well I would say, look if you really want to deal with the economic fallout from this, just re-open the economy. That would be a big first step but this note; I have really issues with this because this notion of "managing the economy", where did this ever come from? The Thailand I came to I never had heard of this before up until a couple of years ago when this all began. The reason that it kind of concerns me is a Center for Economic Situation Administration, administering the economic situation, I mean people kind of forget what the word Soviet used to mean in the old Soviet Union. It was Committee, it was essentially Government by Committee. So when I see these Committees set up out there it really gives me some chills. Not a lot of people study the Soviet Union. Just on a personal note I mean I have read, I find Eastern European especially the Byzantine Empire and the Russian Empire after that really fascinating parts of history and so I have read books from each of the eras from the Byzantine Empire all the way through the Romanov Dynasty, into the revolution and then the takeover by the Bolsheviks and then sort of the Stalinist era, the Khrushchev era, the Brezhnev era, leading up to Gorbachev and then the fall of the wall and then sort of modern Russia. There is a great book on modern, well it is not even really modern Russian now but '90s Russia called the Oligarchs which is quite fascinating. 

The reason I am making the video is I am kind of scared that this kind of Soviet kind of Committee thinking is seeping into policy making with respect to the economy. My personal opinion is the best thing we can do in Thailand now to get things moving is just reopen. Just let's get on with it; let's get all these restrictions and management and administration out of the way and let's get on to making some money, frankly. Let's get on, and I am not saying there is not a place for Government. You can't have just absolutely wanton lawlessness in your economy because it least all kinds of fraud; it can lead to capital mismanagement; it can lead to all kinds of crime, I get that but this notion that just "the economy needs to be managed", I question the entire premise that that is the case.