As prices of goods, food items, and essential supplies continue to rise in Iran, the state-run ILNA News Agency quoted a labor activist saying that the price of a single grain of rice is now 800 rials.
ILNA reported on Thursday, December 11, that the price of medicine is once again increasing and, according to official reports, will rise by four to twelve times.
Nader Moradi, a labor activist, told this state-run outlet that the soaring prices of essential goods mean “the result of this trend is breaking the backs of poor and defenseless people. Pressure of this magnitude has no precedent in recent years.”
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Criticizing the steep rise in basic living necessities, he added, “Today, each kilo of Iranian rice costs about 400,000 tomans. With a simple calculation, we see that the price of a single grain of rice is about 80 tomans (800 rials).” He also noted that each U.S. dollar is currently traded at around 125,000 tomans (1.25 million rials).
Moradi questioned what level rice prices will reach after the “removal of preferential currency” and asked what the “new price shock will do to people’s tables.”
In this context, the state-run Ham-Mihan newspaper wrote on December 9 that monthly, year-on-year, and point-to-point inflation of food items continues to climb. According to the report, from October 2024 to October 2025, “the price of each kilo of beans increased by 255%, rising from 124,000 tomans to 443,000 tomans.”
The report states, “For several years now, Iranian rice has disappeared from household tables, and studies show that this product, with a 155% increase, rose from an average of 124,000 tomans to 316,000 tomans in October.”
According to Ham-Mihan, the price of Iranian rice, depending on type and quality, ranges from 260,000 tomans to 480,000 tomans.
But beyond these items, other essential foods have also risen by 20% to 100%, including notable increases in bread prices.
Ham-Mihan also wrote that “red meat, depending on type, has increased by 25% to 30% in the past year and now costs around 1 million tomans per kilo.”
According to reports, many of these price hikes were authorized by Iran’s regime, even as Masoud Pezeshkian’s government has repeatedly opposed increasing the minimum wage for workers.
Earlier, on October 31, Morteza Afghah, an economist and faculty member at Ahvaz University, warned in an interview with the state-run Khabar Online that if Masoud Pezeshkian’s government fails to control tensions, Iran will face a “major stagflation,” predicting that “the inflation rate may exceed 60% by year’s end.”
Moradi told ILNA, “No matter how much wages increase, they cannot compensate for this compounded inflation. With these right-wing and contractionary policies, workers’ purchasing power and the real value of wages will decline even further next year.”
Workers are paid in tomans while costs rise in dollars
Currently, the base monthly wage for workers covered by labor law is close to 11 million tomans, and with benefits it reaches about 15 million tomans. In contrast, labor groups aligned with the regime say that the monthly cost-of-living basket has reached 58 million tomans (approximately 465 dollars).
Yet even this modest wage is paid with delays of one to several months in many factories and companies, leading repeatedly to labor strikes and protests.
Moradi added that “there is no oversight” regarding Iran’s inflation trend, explaining, “There are constant reports about financial imbalance and the rally of rising dollar and gold prices. On December 10, the dollar reached over 124,000 tomans; look how far wages have collapsed—the base wage is under 100 dollars.”
He continued, “The minimum wage plus universal benefits for a worker with one child is about 15 million tomans. Considering the dollar price on December 10 (124,870 tomans), this amounts to about 120 dollars.”
Moradi said, “A worker who works eight hours a day and forty-four hours a week ends up earning 120 dollars a month—and must survive an entire month on this meager income.”
He called for comparing “this tiny amount” with the wages of minimum-income workers in other countries, including neighboring states, stressing: “The result is clear: Iranian workers have fallen sharply below the poverty line.”
Minimum wages in Iran’s neighboring countries and the United States
Reports indicate that the minimum wage in Iraq this year is about twice that of Iran: 240 dollars per month.
The minimum wage in Turkey ranges from 620 to 730 dollars, in Turkmenistan around 400 dollars, in Azerbaijan about 235 dollars, in Pakistan 130 to 140 dollars, in Armenia about 190 dollars, and in Afghanistan between 70 and 80 dollars.
In the United States, although the federal minimum wage is 7 dollars and 25 cents per hour, different states set higher pay rates for workers.
Hourly pay is 16.66 dollars in Washington State, 16.50 dollars in California, 14 dollars in Florida, and 13 dollars in Alaska.
The minimum wage is 15 dollars per hour in Delaware, Illinois, New Jersey, Rhode Island, and New York; 12.41 dollars in Virginia; 15 dollars in Maryland; and 17.95 dollars in the District of Columbia, where the U.S. capital is located.
In several states—including Utah, Idaho, North Dakota, Iowa, Wisconsin, Kansas, Texas, Indiana, North Carolina, and New Hampshire—the hourly minimum wage remains 7.25 dollars.
Meanwhile, people in the U.S. can purchase a kilo of basmati rice for between 2.75 dollars and 4.50 dollars, depending on the store—roughly the price range that Moradi referred to in his interview with the state-run Mehr News Agency.
