(^480) THE WEALTH AND POVERTY OF NATIONS
the day; the air was unbreathable. Today, half the traffic cops in the city
are suffering from respiratory illness, and a 1990 study reports that bad
air (lead levels three times those in Europe or the United States) costs
six points in IQ by age seven.^13
In short, urban Thais are richer, but also poorer. Not in income, but
in quality of life.* Only 2 percent of Bangkok's population is tied to
proper sewage disposal. The water table is falling; the city is sinking
into a treeless river delta that lies open to ocean flooding. Bad living
conditions impede further development. Thailand has gone about as
far as it can on the basis of cheap labor; cheaper labor lies just across
the border. It now needs high-tech, knowledge-intensive industry,
which calls for foreign investors and expatriate technicians, and they
won't come to breathe poison. Meanwhile the macroeconomic fig
ures show spectacular growth and are swelled by the very effort to
correct these maladies. Antipollution devices and measures, waste dis
posal, medical care, and similar expenditures show up on the plus side
of income and product accounts.
"They Can Have Any Color They Want":
The American and Japanese
Automobile Industries
Henry Ford, in one of his wry brags, said that the buyers of his cars
could have them in any color they wanted, so long as it was black.
This was in the heyday of the Model T, which in fact was made at
various times in a number of colors, though only one color at a time.
That was the essence of Ford's philosophy of mass production: make
all the cars alike, and make a lot of them. Sell them cheap and
everyone will buy them. People who wanted styling and individuality
could look elsewhere. Or buy a Model T chassis and have the
coachwork done to order.^14
The Ford principles became the basis of the American automobile
manufacture, and of other branches as well. The American car
industry became the world bellwether: biggest maker and exporter,
- Annual income per household in 1995 for the Bangkok metropolitan area was es
timated at 2.5 times the average for the entire kingdom. Achavanuntakul, "Effects of
Government Policies," p. 9.