Transcript of the above video: 

As the title of this video suggests, we are discussing I think certain Ministries in Thailand being shocked by foreigners working illegally. When I first, I'll get to the article I am going to cite here in a minute, when I first read this I kept thinking of the scene in Casablanca where the French Prefect is talking to Rick - the guy played by Humphrey Bogart - and he's shutting down his café and Rick walks up to him because they've been friends for years and know each other and he says: "What are you doing? What is the big idea here?" And he says: "I am shocked, shocked, that there is gambling on these premises!" And this was sort of a known open secret and that. The reason I thought of that is because I don't think it is entirely shocking to the Ministries that there might be foreigners working illegally in Thailand because that is part of their mandate; that is their remit to deal with foreigners working illegally in Thailand. So I don't know how shocked they would be but again I want to make this citation but I just got to thinking: "I am shocked, shocked", you know.

I thought of making this video after reading a recent article from the Pattaya Mail, that is pattayamail.com, the article is titled: Foreigners working without a Permit in Thailand face crackdown. Quoting directly and I am going to quote a small excerpt. I urge those who are watching this video, go check out that article for more detail. Quoting directly: "The Business and Employment Ministries appear shocked after discovering that thousands of foreigners are involved in illegal employment in Thai Resorts such as Phuket, Chiang Mai and Pattaya in a variety of occupations including taxi drivers, tour operators and real estate agents." As noted in another video, barbers, hairdressers, hair stylists also seem to be something that is really up on the radar, raising red flags amongst folks who are charged with enforcing Thai Employment Law.

As we have discussed in prior videos, yeah foreigners are restricted from acting as real estate agents - agents generally by the way - and taxi drivers, tour operators as well are restricted occupations. I have gone into great lengths and gone into great depth on the restricted occupations here in Thailand; I am not going to go back through that again. I do know this is a topic that makes foreign nationals living in Thailand pretty uneasy and I understand why and I am not making these videos to try to, I don't know, I've been accused of trying to put people on the spot about this issue or something, that is not my point. It's worth noting if you are a foreign expat that lives here, when heightened scrutiny is placed on foreign workers, it affects pretty much everybody. That said, it is worth noting and for folks that are here in Thailand - sort of new folks here in Thailand - sort of trying to make their way and work here, you have got to understand, the restrictions on foreign labour are pretty stringent and you do not have an unfettered right to work in Thailand. That is a privilege if you will of Thai Citizenship and something that locals only in certain cases, can engage in. 

So the thing to take away from this video is one understand there are restricted occupations and you need to try to ascertain whether or not what you want to do in terms of employment activity here in Thailand is in violation of those restrictions. Furthermore if you are not, even if it's not a violation of the restricted occupations, you still need to get a Work Permit anyway in order to work and do business here in the Kingdom of Thailand.