Economic hardship has paralysed life in Iran

Shahrzad News interviewed 15 ordinary Iranian families, hoping to discover whether economic hardship was affecting only those in the capital or whether those outside were suffering as well.

A retired couple in the city of Qum:

As retired civil servants on fixed monthly pensions, conditions are particularly hard for us. Whether the cost of living rises by a million tomans a month or two million, we still have to survive on a 600,000 toman pension. We are constantly reducing our expenditure, cutting out more and more basic necessities. We don’t know how this situation came about but we expect the authorities responsible for the well-being of Qum citizens to do something about it. We don’t live in a luxury apartment, and we have very little in the bank. All we can do is try to survive on the bare minimum.

A 55-year-old woman in Tehran:

Prices are just mind-boggling! We can never be sure that a basic necessity won’t cost more tomorrow. Recently I bought a can of cooking oil and the shopkeeper told me to buy as many as I could, because the price would be going up the next day. But buying two cans of cooking oil instead of one isn’t going to solve our problems. There are only two of us, and I feel sorry for people with several children. How on earth can they manage? Even a 100-gram packet of loose-leaf tea now costs 3000 tomans!

A 52-year-old woman in Isfahan:

People’s purchasing power has fallen dramatically. A year ago you might go into a supermarket and spend 10,000 tomans on vegetables and other food. Today the same amount will cost 100,000 tomans!

A 30-year-old single woman in Tehran:

My salary is 500,000 tomans. Although I am single and live alone, I still have to make ends meet. I have health insurance, but the kind of illness I have means I have to pay for a doctor and visits to a private hospital myself. In practice 500,000 is almost nothing when you consider the rate of inflation and the cost of living in this city.

A 26-year-old man in Tehran:

Sanctions have forced people to try to survive on staple foods, and only buy things when absolutely necessary. When the toman falls against foreign currencies the price of every commodity goes up. People have to look around before buying the most basic things. I’m sure the actual rate of inflation is somewhere between 200 and 300%.

A 21-year-old man in Karaj:

Prices have gone up but hopefully they will fall in the near future, and Iran will be a more stable and prosperous country. It is true that a packet of cigarettes which cost 1700 tomans last year now costs 5000; that a loaf of bread has gone from 100 tomans to 600, and pizza from 9000 to 18,000. One reason could be that Iran wants to be self-sufficient. We might have a decade of economic austerity and hardship, but the future could be better.

A 30-year-old man with four children in Tehran:

Obviously life is very hard if you don’t have enough income to support your family. Meat, fruit and other food has become so expensive that the government is proposing a 200,000 toman hand-out for every household. But as everyone knows, when this government gives you 200,000 tomans it takes back 400,000. After the subsidy reforms they gave every family 40,000 tomans a month, but then multiplied the cost of everything.

A 54-year-old unemployed man with four children in Tehran:

In the middle of this unprecedented economic recession I lost my job and now don’t have a penny to spend on anything. Meanwhile every single necessity has gone up by 80%. The reason for this economic mess is that the authorities are not doing their job. During the war we were under immense economic and psychological pressure, and yet never suffered such a level of economic hardship. This country has enough to ensure prosperity for everyone. It’s just that we don’t have any efficient managers.

A 30-year-old woman in Tehran working as a minicab driver:

Petrol currently costs 800 tomans a litre. At the end of the day a private minicab driver like me has nothing to live on. The high value of foreign currency and gold has pushed up the price of everything.

A 34-year-old woman in Hamedan:

There are no limits to the levels of poverty and desperation in today’s Iran. The sanctions have made life miserable for everyone.

- Shahrzad News