By entering the East Asian economic model (EAEM) in the 1950s, the Thai economy was committed to the export-oriented, import-substituting low labour-cost manufacturing paradigm that Vietnam and Cambodia have more recently embraced. The EAEM provides for some success in expanding employment in the manufacturing sector and promoting income generation for its workers and, overall, in promoting national economic development. However, this is a model that has effectiveness that is limited in time, since the very process of national economic development tends to increase incomes and, thereby, undermine.
