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The International Journal of the Royal Society of Thailand
Volume XII, 2020

covered in the RD sample data set for the reason advanced above and there is
little or no reporting of income from abroad or capital gains on shares and other
financial assets. Yet evidence from other studies and datasets indicates that

wealth is highly concentrated implying that investment income and rents are
important sources of income for the relatively well off and especially for the
top 1 percent.

One picture of wealth and income at the top is provided by data on the
income of 220 members of the national legislative assembly (NLA) declared to
the National Counter Corruption Commission in 2014. While the returns were
not verified, assembly members risked being disqualified for false returns.
Most of the 220 assembly members were high-level bureaucrats and military
officers with some business executives or reputable business owners. This was a
highly privileged segment and may not be representative of the 200,000 persons
in the top 1%. Nevertheless the sources and composition of income of this
sample give an indication of the pattern at the top.

The average annual income for all NLA members was 5.5 million baht,
which is much more than the average gross income of the top 600 in the tax
sample. In the NLA dataset, salary accounted for 35.3 percent of total income,
and allowances and fees for 19.5 percent, making a total of 54.8 percent for
“employment income” compared to 87 percent in the tax data. Dividends and
interest income accounted for 35.8 percent and rents 1.7 percent (see Table 2).

Table 2 Yearly Income of 220 National Legislative Assembly members, 2014

Average income (%)
(Baht)
All members

Salary etc. 1,892,402 35.3
Meeting Allowances and fees 1,041,709 19.5

Interest income 392,887 7.3
Rent income 90,010 1.7
Dividends 1,524,536 28.5

Other 413,891 7.7
Total 5,355,433 100.0

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