The state-run Tasnim News Agency, which is affiliated with Iran’s security apparatus, published a report emphasizing that the “recent wave of price hikes” has further reduced the purchasing power of the working class.
This state media outlet wrote that “data and field reports on living costs over the past four to five months indicate that the minimum livelihood basket for workers, based on food expenses, has increased by approximately 40%.”
According to Tasnim News Agency, workers’ wages “do not even cover half of their monthly expenses, as a significant portion of workers’ income is spent on rent.”
The gap between income and expenses for various segments of Iranian society, particularly workers, grows wider every day, which is why labor and professional protests are becoming a daily occurrence.
Meanwhile, the 2025 budget is being drafted in the regime’s Majlis (parliament), and a former MP states that even if wages in Iran were to increase fivefold, the standard of living would “only approach the global poverty line.”
Esmail Grami Moghaddam, a former member of Majlis, stated in an op-ed published on Sunday, November 24, in the state-run Etemad newspaper that “stagflation” is a barrier to achieving prosperity and that overcoming it is “extremely difficult.”
He stressed that “60% of Iran’s economy is tied to institutions whose revenues and expenditures are not reflected in the government’s budget,” and “to analyze the situation, we must focus on the visible 40% of Iran’s economy.”
Meanwhile, Iran’s Statistical Center announced on November 21 that the annual inflation rate has reached 33.1%, and Ahmad Meidari, the Minister of Cooperatives, Labor, and Social Welfare, claimed that pension funds are responsible for inflation in Iran.
The expansion of protests by various groups, including retirees, workers in different industries, teachers, defrauded investors, nurses, and healthcare workers, reflects the growing livelihood problems in Iran and the disregard of Iranian regime officials.
