The news site Rouydad 24 reports that although income and wages in Iran have increased by an average of 30 percent over the past 12 months, the rate of inflation has surpassed 50 percent in the same period. The rising price of food, in particular, is creating severe financial strains on Iranian households.
Historically, the rate of increase in food prices one year has been matched by comparable salary hikes the following year, but for two years in a row food prices have soared far beyond wage increases. According to the report, “this catastrophe has created the biggest drop in household purchasing power.”
Citing data from the Statistical Center of Iran, the report says that the rate of inflation in food prices in the three lowest income deciles reached 60 percent in August, which is without precedent over the last four decades. At the same time last year, food inflation in the lower income deciles was 21 percent.
The president of the union of grocery stores and meat markets, Saeed Derakhshani, said in an interview with the Entekhab website that “the rise in the price of consumer goods and the decrease in purchasing power has caused the rate of sales in our union to fall to its lowest, and that’s why 15 to 20 percent of the grocery stores and supermarkets in Iran have closed their doors.”