Time is relatively cheap in Vietnam: Causes & Consequences

Consider the following three observations.

(1)    The trip to Halong Bay: At the end of our time in Hanoi, we rode a bus to the breathtaking Halong Bay. Our destination was only about 200 km from Hanoi, but it took us about four hours; so our speed was about 50 km per hour, or a little above 30 miles per hour. Since Halong Bay is a major tourist destination, in the US there would be an interstate connecting a capital city and a rapidly developing tourist attraction. Instead we were on a simple four-lane (sometimes two-lane) highway, jam-packed with motor scooters, bicycles, and pedestrians that went through the center of every town along the way. As if we were in the pre-interstate US of the 1950s! Why hasn’t this society demanded more convenient transportation methods? For such a short distance, why did we spend so much time in the bus?

(2)    The search for underwear and socks: Scott, CJ, and I had the misfortune of landing in Hanoi without our checked luggage. The next day we began a serious search for some clothing essentials. Despite being in the middle of a 2.6 million-person city, with hundreds of shops within walking distance, and under the guidance of our Vietnamese guide Vu and our hotel concierge, our search was relatively fruitless. After three hours we came back with two pairs of socks of unknown quality. Where were the clothing department stores that make underwear shopping so quick and painless in the US? We had better things to do than shop for underwear, why did it take so long?

(3)    Lonely shopkeepers and over–staffed tourist stops: Almost every time I walked into a small, privately-owned shop in Hanoi or Hoi An it was empty, except for the sole worker who is usually thrilled to see me. I suspect that most of these shops make very few sales per day. Thus the shop owner’s monetary return on the long hours they spend in the shop must be tiny. On the other hand, in the “fancy” tourist shops that our tour bus frequents for bathroom stops are always full of employees who do little but get in the way of each other. We never see the natives in these shops since the shelves contain expensive stuff that would only appeal to a rich visitor of Vietnam. These shops must do pretty well given the number of sales clerks they can employ; but do you really need four people to work one cash register? Probably not; but if these sales clerks are willing to work for a really low wage, why not hire a bunch?

I think these three observations are connected. Labor is cheap in Vietnam, due to the combination of many people needing to work, and few desirable jobs. Vu says it’s common for college-educated Vietnamese to work in their family’s shop, or as a sales clerk serving tourists. Being here, it makes sense to me that the real per-capita income of Vietnam is $3,074, whereas the real per-capita income of the US is $42,296. The flip-side to cheap labor is cheap time; and the flip-side to expensive labor is expensive time. Most Americans now realize that “time is money.” Since our time is so valuable, we don’t want to waste it. We demand a society based on speed and convenience. And that drives the constant change we see in the US.

Right now Vietnam is just the opposite; fast-food, fast-travel, fast-shopping, fast-anything simply does not exist. Why bother economizing on time? Time is cheap.

Me making an Hoi An shopkeeper happy.

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