Protests Continue in Iran in Response to Current Social and Economic Crises
In recent weeks, many protests have taken place across Iran because of society’s agitation at the Iranian regime’s lack of attempts to resolve the current social and economic crises in Iran.
On Tuesday, retirees from Iran’s Health Ministry held protests in cities across Iran demanding that they receive their delayed pensions and bonuses that the regime has refused to adjust to fit the rising inflation rate.
On September 3, just before the start of the new academic year, Iranian teachers began the first of many protests in response to the lack of employment opportunities and low salaries.
The NCRI said, “There have been many protests by the green report card teachers, who have passed the Education Ministry’s employment test. Still, the regime has so far refused to employ them despite the shortage of teachers across Iran.”
The regime is not adjusting pensions and salaries to fit with the current economic situation. Wages were increased in April to 39% but considering the rising inflation rate since then, the rise is nowhere near enough for people to comfortably live on.
In a quote from Ali Aslani from the board of directors of Islamic Labor Councils, the Kar-o Kargar daily wrote, “A 39% increase in salaries in 2021 will cover only 37 percent of the people’s cost of living. A worker’s salary of 4 million Tomans covers only ten days of the month, and after that, the workers barely make ends meet until the end of the month. They have to remove many of the basic expenses of their lives.”
According to the state-run media and officials, Iran’s poverty line is estimated to be around 10 million tomans. Meanwhile, the salary base is 3.9 million tomans.
Etemad daily explained that according to the Statistics Center of Iran, the estimated poverty line figure sits between 11 and 12 million tomans, but many teachers earn less than half of that.
According to Article 41 of the regime’s labor law, it states that ‘salaries should be adjusted with the inflation rate’ and that wages ‘should be enough to provide the minimum of a life.”
In other words, the regime could help Iranians by at least implementing its labor law. But as time passes, it becomes clearer that the clerical regime is not willing to help Iranians.
To date, Ebrahim Raisi, the regime’s new president, along with his administration has yet to establish a plan to resolve the economic issues faced by Iranians or to combat the rising inflation rates. During his tours around the country following his inauguration in August, Raisi has only offered false promises to Iranian citizens, claiming that, “if God wills,” the problems would be resolved!”
Etemad daily stated in their September 28 publication that many of the problems that need to be resolved to need clear legislation to overcome them and they believe that Raisi either lacks the will or the ability to assign tasks that need to be completed to advance the efforts to resolve the crises.
In fact, Raisi’s government is handpicked by the regime’s Supreme Leader for consolidating power in the regime through terrorism and domestic oppression. The regime’s oppression is aimed to reduce protests and control Iran’s restive society.
Iran’s Tax-Exempt Companies Wield Power
An economist linked to the Iranian government says that 20 rent-seeking companies under the control of the regime’s supreme leader have a profit of more than 250 trillion tomans ($9 billion) and are exempt from paying taxes.
Hossein Raghfar, an economist, citing statistics from the Central Bank of Iran, has stated that 20 large state-owned rent-seeking companies in 2020 had a net profit of 250 trillion tomans, which, according to him, is equal to the government budget deficit, although other sources, including the report of the Court of Accounts of the Government Parliament, considers the figure of the government budget deficit to be higher than this figure.
According to Raghfar, the country’s trade balance has been positive in the first five months of 2021, but the government is still suffering from a huge budget deficit.
Although according to Raghfar, the government can compensate for this budget deficit from the place of taxation, the experience of previous years in the Rouhani government showed that in practice, taxation is done only from low-income groups and lower deciles of society. The upper deciles of society are tax-exempt due to their relationship with organizations of power and wealth.
Raghfar points out that in practice what will provide for the budget deficit will come from the pockets of the low-income groups, not organizations such as rent-seeking companies with a profit of 250 trillion tomans.
One of the main proposals made in recent years by government economists as a source of income for the budget deficit is to tax the vacant houses and real estate, which according to evidence and statistics about 2.5 million vacant houses in Tehran are at the disposal of banks and other powerful government-affiliated economic entities.
In other parts of the world, however, real estate taxes are one of the main sources of revenue for the budget.
However, due to the collusion of the authorities and despite numerous proposals to collect taxes from these vacant houses, the higher institutions in the government, such as the parliament, never accepted such a proposal.
Referring to the generous corruption of the government to its subordinates, Raghfar states that the governments, one after the other, ‘gave the country’s mineral resources to friends and comrades’ within the three decades after the war and did not receive any taxes from them.
Raghfar adds that the people’s share of these ‘beloved’ should be taken, but there is no will do so, otherwise, the solutions to the budget deficit are very clear.
He adds that today the country’s large mines are owned by non-taxable government’s ‘beloved’ and none of these companies and individuals have productive activities but produce natural resources that belong to all segments of the Iranian people, but they try to keep these cases hidden from view.
The people and the society should not find out about this situation and this secrecy should continue because, in this way, they can pocket huge resources.
Raghfar announces the amount of tax evasion of the power entities as 50 trillion tomans and adds that this tax evasion is not a small number, so why is this amount of tax evasion not stopped?
Referring to the 50 trillion toman tax evasion, Raghfar states that no tax exemptions are reported in this regime and add that when presenting the 2021 budget to the parliament, the government was asked to announce the number of tax exemptions, but the government has not taken any action.
Raghfar argues that part of the institutions and private companies owned by those in power are tax-exempt and pay only 2% tax instead of 20%.
Iranian Government Continues To Violate Nuclear Deal Commitments
The Iranian regime has backtracked on its commitments to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) by refusing to allow United Nations inspectors to repair the monitoring equipment at their nuclear facilities, despite agreeing to the request two weeks prior.
According to the Director-General of the IAEA, Rafael Grossi, the regime’s decision to ban UN inspectors from the TESA Karaj centrifuge component manufacturing workshop ‘is contrary to the agreed terms of the joint statement issued on 12 September’.
Grossi traveled to Tehran in mid-September and reached an agreement with the Iranian regime to proceed with the overdue servicing of its equipment in nuclear facilities. The agreement was meant to avoid further tensions with the international community ahead of the meeting of the IAEA’s Board of Governors and create the grounds to resume negotiations over Iran’s nuclear program.”
The regime has continued to deceive the IAEA at every turn in an attempt to hide their nuclear activities. They have declined to answer questions about traces of uranium that were found at three undeclared facilities and have refused to adhere to the 2015 nuclear deal agreement to reduce their stockpile of highly enriched uranium.
This is just one of a series of recent events that have proven the Iranian regime’s unwillingness to resolve issues surrounding its nuclear program.
Earlier this month, the IAEA issued a report warning the international community of the regime’s growing stockpile of highly enriched uranium, as well as their lack of cooperation in regards to the maintenance of the monitoring equipment at their nuclear facilities.
Grossi stated in a report in August that the inspectors he had sent to Tehran had confirmed that the regime had then produced 200 grams of 20 percent enriched uranium metal. Two months earlier, during a convention of the IAEA board of governors, he had warned that the regime’s unwillingness to answer their questions seriously affects the ability of the IAEA to provide assurance of the peaceful nature of Iran’s nuclear program’.
In February, IAEA inspectors confirmed that the regime had produced 3.6 grams of uranium metal at the Isfahan nuclear plant. The regime claims that it needs highly enriched uranium for civilian purposes.
European members of the 2015 nuclear deal, formerly known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) have stated their concern over the regime’s production of the uranium metal and confirmed that Iran does not need it for civilian purposes. Instead, it is a ‘key step in the development of a nuclear weapon’.
In his recent speech to the UN General Assembly, Raisi reiterated that his regime would not come under compliance with the JCPOA until all sanctions were lifted. He made no mention of his regime’s dangerous stockpile of highly enriched uranium.
The reality is that the Iranian government has been deceiving the world by hiding its nuclear program, all the while, the international community’s only method of trying to curb their activities is by granting concessions or by showing complacency.
Any agreement that does not completely close down the regime’s bomb-making, enrichment, and nuclear facilities is unacceptable from the view of the Iranian people.
Iran’s Killer Judges, Responsible for Murder and Forced Disappearance of Political Prisoners
In the world of Iran’s criminal officials, people like Afshin Mohammadi Darreh Shouri are committing more crimes in dirty competition to reach higher levels and gain more power and wealth.
Afshin Mohammadi Darreh Shouri, an infamous human rights violator, who has bestowed on himself the title of a doctor, an event that has become a ridicule common act in Iran’s ruling class, by many officials while having even not a diploma or university educations, is the person who has approved and finally signed the court verdict for Navid Afkari’s execution. He had also threatened political prisoner Shahin Nasseri with death many times.
He is currently the Deputy Prosecutor of Shiraz. Confirmation and signature of investigator Afshin Mohammadi Darreh Shouri in the final order of Branch 10 of the Special Prosecutor’s Office for Criminal Affairs and Security Crimes in Shiraz, eventually led to the issuance of the second death sentence for Navid Afkari by Judge Mahmoud Sadati.
Mohammadi Darreh Shouri has been involved in cases against political and security prisoners for several years as an investigator in Branch 10 of the Special Court for Criminal Affairs and Security Crimes in Shiraz.
Due to these services in favor of the regime’s human rights violations, in mid-July of 2021, he was appointed as the Deputy Prosecutor of Shiraz.
Mohammadi Darreh Shouri is the same person who repeatedly threatened Shahin Naseri with death and threatened to kill him personally. Dissidents believe he is responsible for the ambiguous death of political prisoner Shahin Naseri.
The newly murdered prisoner, Shahin Naseri, had said: “Interrogator Afshin Mohammadi asked me, what did you see in the police station, that you want to testify here? ‘ I began to explain everything I had seen – the torture of Navid Afkari. The interrogator cut off my speech in a very bad tone, insulting and threatening me, and said, you are interfering in a security case, I will make life a living hell for you.”
It is because of these ‘good deeds’ to the regime that he was praised and favored by the repressive groups of enjoining the good and forbidding the evil, and they wrote a letter of appreciation to him:
“Jihadi groups commanding the good and forbidding the evil of the anonymous martyrs and the custodian of the martyrs by sending and delivering letters of support to the esteemed head of the judiciary, Hojjatoleslam Gholam Hossein Mohseni Ejei and the director-general of justice of Fars province Hojjatoleslam Seyyed Kazem Mousavi, announced their thanks and support of the valuable actions of the anti-corruption judge, Dr. Afshin Mohammadi Darreh Shouri, the Honorable Deputy Public Prosecutor and the head of the Shiraz Criminal and Security Prosecutor’s Office and called for a decisive investigation into corruption cases without any tolerance as before.”
Reminder:
Shahin Naseri, a witness to the torture of Navid Afkari, Iran’s wrestling champion who was executed in Iran on September 12, 2020, died under suspicious circumstances at the Greater Tehran Penitentiary.
Shahin Naseri’s brother confirmed the news and said: “His friends told us that he was killed in solitary confinement. But no official has contacted us yet.”
A source close to Naseri’s family said: “A few days ago, coinciding with the first anniversary of the execution of Navid Afkari, he (Shahin) was transferred from the hall where he was held at the Greater Tehran Penitentiary (GTP) to an unknown location. We thought he had been transferred to a security agency because he had been repeatedly threatened by security officials to remain silent about the Afkari brothers‘ case, but a few days ago we found out that he was being held in GTP. Shahin Naseri had no underlying illness, and his abrupt death is quite suspicious.”
In October 2019, Shahin Naseri filed a signed statement with the judiciary in which he said when he was brought into the police station in Shiraz in late September 2018 (soon after Afkari’s arrest), he saw Afkari being severely beaten by two plain-clothed men with a metal bar and a baton, cursing and telling him to confess to their version of the murder of a security guard in August 2018.
Inaction From the West Emboldens Iranian Government To Continue Nuclear Deception
The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) said on Sunday that the Iranian regime refused to honor the terms of the 2015 nuclear deal by preventing inspectors from servicing monitored nuclear facilities two weeks ago.
On the eve of a meeting of the IAEA’s Board of governors, Grossi reached an agreement with Tehran, allowing the IAEA inspectors to service monitoring equipment. This joint statement was released while many western powers were considering adopting perhaps the most serious measures against Tehran’s provocative actions.
The regime has once again dodged the international community’s attempts to thwart their nuclear extortion while they continue to escalate their nuclear program. The only method that Western powers must control the regime’s nuclear program is through negotiations with the mullahs, however, the regime is continuously using those negotiations to bide time and secretly advance its activities.
This was confirmed in an interview with the regime’s current deputy Foreign Minister Ali Bagheri Kani in 2019. He explained how the regime uses negotiations as leverages to advance its nuclear extortion. Kani said, “…we bought some time. But when they were ready to negotiate a deal, the negotiation process expedited.”
In 2015, world leaders made an agreement with the regime, formerly known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA). This deal put supposed limits on the regime to reduce their capability to make any major advance on their nuclear program, but the regime has continued to defy these sanctions every step of the way.
In 2018, Tehran rapidly started violating its commitments under the JCPOA terms. In less than two years, the regime was able to rapidly enrich uranium even higher than 20%. In August 2021, the regime announced it would begin enriching uranium up to 60% purity.
Back in August, the IAEA reported on the regime’s current progress in their production of enriched uranium metal, the only purpose of which is to develop nuclear weapons.
The former head of the regime’s Atomic Energy Organization, Ali Akbar Salehi acknowledged in 2020 that the regime was deceiving foreign powers during negotiations. He stated that while the Western leaders thought they had won the negotiations, the regime had countermeasures in place to prevent them from being ‘trapped in the enrichment deadlock’.
President-elect of the NCRI, Maryam Rajavi stated in 2020 that, “the policies and actions of the mullahs’ regime…leave no doubt that this regime has never given up the project to acquire an atomic bomb and continues the deception and concealment.”
Despite their best efforts, western powers have not achieved their initial goal of curbing the regime’s nuclear programs with their sanctions. The regime has only deceived the international community at every turn, despite warnings and information supplied by the Iranian Resistance.
Failing to achieve a nuclear bomb is an existential threat to the mullahs’ regime. The regime obtaining a nuclear bomb would be serious to the world’s peace and security.
Iran’s ‘Strategic Solitude’
For many years the Iranian government is witnessing global isolation, and isolation which is because of the regime’s nontransparent and dangerous nuclear project, its malign acts in the Middle East, support of terrorism, its missile project, and finally the most important its human rights violations case.
The advancement of these policies is because of the ruling theocracy’s reactionary and tension-seeking nature, under the pretext of export of its so-called Islamic revolution.
All of them are in line with the repression of the people and hiding its internal crisis from the world. The truth is that in a short time these policies have achievements for the regime, but in the long period, they are to the detriment of the regime.
Even worse they have put the regime in a confrontation with the world and the entire Middle East, in addition, it has increased its internal crises.
The state-run daily Etemad confessed to this isolation in an article entitled ‘Iran’s strategic solitude, De-stressing, and introverted’ and wrote:
“’Iran’s strategic loneliness’ has created many bottlenecks and tragedies for our country, especially in the contemporary history of Iran.
“This loneliness is inherently stressful. Tensions with Turkish neighbors, tensions with Russian neighbors, tensions with Arab neighbors, tensions with Pashtun neighbors, tensions with Uzbeks, tensions with religious and linguistic backgrounds that are inconsistent with the religion and language of Iranian society, tensions with an international order, and, most importantly, contextless tensions with coalitions and political alliances, etc.
“On the other hand, tensions, especially constant tensions with the surrounding environment and the world, are gradually destroying the roots of development and leading the country to poverty and backwardness from its neighbors and peers, conflict and violence, and finally disintegration.” (Etemad, September 22, 2021)
In such a situation, naturally, the speech of the regime’s President Ebrahim Raisi at the UN General Assembly should be in the favor of de-escalation and solving these issues, but to the contrary, he made things even worse so that even the state media mocked him.
The state-run daily Setareh-e-Sobh wrote: “There can be no meaningful connection between Raisi’s presence at the UN General Assembly and the future of the JCPOA. The criterion for the conclusion of the JCPOA is to change the Islamic Republic’s positions on the JCPOA on the one hand, and on the other hand, Western countries, especially the United States, take practical steps to revive the JCPOA, including the lifting of sanctions.” (State-run daily Setareh-e-Sobh, September 22, 2021)
The necessity to take practical steps to revive the JCPOA and essentially improve relations with Western countries is to retreat in three areas of nuclear, regional policy, and cut support of terrorism, and stepping back from the missile program.
Another daily while referring to ‘burnt opportunities’ wrote:
“The president’s words had no positive point. Repeating repeated statements and saying sentences that were more like headlines.
“First, in this text, we should express our firm views on the continuation of negotiations, the need for sanctions relief, the return of blocked money, continued cooperation with the IAEA, the issue of oil and energy, and Tehran’s relations with neighbors, and then in the second step, let’s move on to the issue of Afghanistan, the situation in Yemen and Syria, and finally talk about pandemic conditions in the world.” (Aftab-e-Yazd, September 22, 2021)
Another daily also mocked Raisi and wrote:
“He started with a series of general descriptions that began that we are an old, independent country and we have our own opinions.
“These positions were not very new and had been announced many times before. Since there was no new word or position in Raisi’s speech, some are likely to object, saying that Iran should take advantage of the opportunity to address the General Assembly in a better way.
“There are criticisms, but it is better not to deal with this issue very much at the very beginning of the government’s work and forget it.” (Jahan-e-Sanat, September 23, 2021)
If the regime does not agree on the JCPOA and other matters that major Western countries expect, in addition to nuclear negotiations with its regional interference and missile program, there will be no agreement.
Meanwhile, the United States has stated that the regime will not receive more from the negotiations and must be convinced of the small level of a privilege it has made in the past few rounds of negotiations in Vienna.
Therefore, the regime must either accept something higher than the 2015 JCPOA and accept a JCPOA+ including limitations to its regional and missile programs, or while raising tensions with these countries, its nuclear case will be sent to the UN Security Council, and it must accept the dangerous consequences.
It is not without reason that Jahan-e-Sanat newspaper advised Raisi to take care of his speech and stances on foreign affairs, especially in the field of nuclear and relations with the United States.
“The U.S. political system and its economy have tremendous influence, despite all the threats it faces, and Russia and China never currently have U.S. power. Therefore, it should be noted that we should not say that only costs for Iran and there is no benefit from it.”
The regime is stuck and must choose between bad and worse, and confronting the international community will solve nothing and will create an even more suffocating atmosphere.
Severity of the COVID-19 and Economic Crises in Iran Is Worsening
Iran’s state-run media have acknowledged just how severe the Covid-19 and economic crises in Iran currently are.
Jahan-e Sanat daily wrote on September 23 that they have noticed the vast difference in how Iran, compared with other countries, is trying to control the coronavirus pandemic.
They said, “The ominous Covid-19 entered towards the end of 2019 and continued throughout 2020 and 2021. It showed after decades our governing and management of a crisis in the country to the showcase of competition with other countries.”
The regime did not fail in managing the Covid-19 crisis. It deliberately used the virus and its mass casualties as a barrier against the popular protests which broke out in 2018 and continued throughout 2019.
Janat-e Sanat explained that the Iranian people are blaming regime authorities for delaying the vaccination program which has led to an ‘unprecedented death toll over the past two months and a collapsing healthcare system’. They also acknowledged that nobody is buying claims from the regime that sanctions are to blame for the hindrances in dealing with the pandemic, instead, they blame the regime’s corruption and ‘economic mismanagement’.
In January of this year, the regime’s supreme leader Ali Khamenei banned the import of all reputable international vaccines and ordered the production of domestic vaccines instead.
The domestic vaccine was produced by the Execution of Imam Khomeini’s Order (EIKO), a huge financial institution Khamenei controls. Now, state-run media acknowledge a part of Khamenei’s scheme to further plunder people by insisting on producing the domestic vaccines.
In an interview with the Sharq daily two weeks ago, Ali Tajernia said that the company behind the domestic vaccine, Barakat, affiliated with the regime, was receiving 200,000 Tomans per each dose of the vaccine, thus giving the regime a reason to be unwilling to buy vaccines from abroad.
State-run Sepid discussed how the pandemic is amplifying the economic problems faced by Iranian citizens. They stated that no one knows the true figures of how many people have lost their lives due to the Covid-19 crisis and questioned how many people were forced to go without treatment considering the expense of a night in the hospital or because the medication Remdesivir is priced at between 700 and 800 thousand tomans, a figure of which many people simply cannot afford given the inflation and poverty crises in Iran.
Sepid said, “No one knows what happened during the consent Covid-19 peaks in slums in marginalized areas and suburbs. Statistics put the number of slum dwellers at between 11 and 25 million and even more, with an estimated 7,600,000 living on the outskirts of cemeteries.”
Looking at the statistics of the poverty level in Iran, Sepid explained that in terms of urban residents, 15.5% are living below the absolute poverty line, while in rural areas, at least a third of residents are struggling.
The ongoing Covid-19 and economic crisis have increased the society’s restiveness, prompting state-run media in recent days to warn officials about another popular uprising.
Iran: Can an Official Survive With 4 Million Tomans?
The life situation of Iran’s workers indicates that the promises of government officials have failed and with the present situation, the government’s role in easing the life conditions of the workers and low-wage people is zero or negligible.
The country’s labor community, while lacking suitable jobs, is facing a staggering and daily increase in food prices, and the living conditions of this stratum who are classified as low wage earners have become even more difficult, and yet they are forced to ignore other needs of their lives, such as housing and clothing.
If until a few years ago only the relative increase in prices and the decrease in purchasing power of people were considered, especially the lower deciles of society in the country, now with the spread of COVID-19, many problems have added to the burden of workers’ problems, especially in the treatment sector.
These days, workers are experiencing many problems at once taking all the opportunities from them to have even a normal life. Problems such as lack of insurance, lack of shelter, unemployment, lack of reasonable and fixed salaries, lack of support, and reduced purchasing power.
The current wage of four million covers only one-third of the current cost of a normal life, so some workers are forced to turn to false and high-risk jobs, an action that can have many social consequences.
These conditions apply to retired and employed workers who are paid every month. There are many workers whose activities are seasonal and are constantly looking for temporary work throughout the year to earn their day in any way, which has led them to turn to false jobs.
In this situation, it should be asked whether the 39 percent increase in the minimum wage this year, which brings the workers’ minimum wages, including all wage benefits, to 4 million even considering the right of children which will rise to 4.2 million tomans, is enough to cover the cost of living? Can officials with astronomical wages manage themselves by receiving 4 million and run the lives of their families for even one or two days?
A key reason for the workers’ situation is the consortium of the mafia in Iran.
Import mafia, rent-seeking mafia, wealth mafia, power-reliant recommendation mafia, the mafia of safe and wealth living regions, these are the realities that statesmen are claiming to deal with them, but this is just a mirage in the regime’s mafia led government and the experience of past governments has shown that it this is not realized.
The reality is that the conflict-of-interest mafia is so powerful that they do not allow anyone to fight those who are themselves the source of corruption.
Put aside the misconception that corruption must be found in the bodies of ministries, government agencies, and corporations. These are the channels of corruption, and the roots of corruption must be searched in institutions affiliated with the regime’s supreme leader Ali Khamenei and the Revolutionary Guards (IRGC) who have captured the entire economy and now are taking the government too if we could call it a government at all.
But the phrase ‘searched’ is wrong because there is nothing hidden. The regime’s mafia is so powerful that they act openly and unafraid.
For example, when the head of the Mostazafan Foundation unveiled the corruption of some officials last year, he was threatened in such a way that he had no other choice but to repent on television and did so to keep himself safe.
The strange part is that the Mostazafan Foundation itself is one of the main sources of the regime’s wealth and corruption. This is what has become the conflict-of-interest mafia in Iran, which is not between ordinary people and small criminals but between the regime’s officials.
And the power-reliant recommendation mafia is now choosing and putting its desired people in the government’s positions, from friends to family members. Therefore no one should expect that the government in such a corrupt regime will be able to act independently.
Now back to the workers. In such a government, with the presence of such mafia, the expensiveness, and inflation that is increasing in the country’s economy in an unbridled way, how should the workers and minimum wage earners manage their lives?
Currently, workers are struggling to survive and undoubtedly are ashamed in front of their families.
The Truth of a Human Disaster in Iran
Equal participation of all the people in creating the law of a country is one of the main necessities to become a progressive and democratic society. This will tie the flourishing human’s talents to a nation with a strong economic and social base and the people’s power will be used for determining collective affairs. It will empower the nation’s feeling of a unique nation.
In such a nation, progress will be equal to freedom and will give the people the opportunity to seek equality which will finally lead to a progressive nation, while eliminating negative competition.
The people will be able to think further than just concerning biological, spiritual, and social necessities, and by recognizing their abilities each of them will become an aid to their society.
While looking at the map of Iran’s development we are witnessing that none of these exist in Iran.
Iran in sub-categories such as life expectancy, access to health and medical services, access to shelter and food and drinking water, basic and advanced education, personal safety, access to information and communication technologies, and other essential technologies of daily life has a concerning condition and it is even not close to the standards of developed countries while closing to the situation of third countries.
Other indicators such as individual freedoms, the right to choose in life, human rights, the equality of social groups, and the right of freedom of expression are signs of Iran’s poor performance, which are big barriers to the country’s progression.
Iran’s performance in economic subindexes of development also shows that those that motivate economic activism such as economic stability, protection of material and intellectual property rights, protection of innovation patents, support for new businesses, and support for small investors are not in favorable conditions, and even most of them are below the global average performance.
Human power could become the strength of Iran’s progression, but this should not be expected in a country under the fundamentalist mullahs’ rule.
But as many of the government’s specialists said, instead of being on the side of the government to help the country’s progression, the people are confronting it. People who do not have the chance to be active in a political and economic environment and do not have the authority to choose their rights are becoming the ‘enemy of the rule’ as these specialists said.
The missing link in Iran’s development is for human beings to be free, and participatory citizens, while this rule has eliminated many of those who even tried or dared to follow this path in the nation’s favor.
Economic growth and individual freedoms have always strengthened each other. The advancement of economic growth requires free activists and the right to choose, and on the other hand, the need to enjoy guaranteed individual rights and freedoms is the existence of a significant level of prosperity.
Statistical evidence shows that there is a correlation between citizens’ freedom and their standard of living. Politically open countries, where the law governs everyone equally, private property rights are protected, and the market economy prevails, grow three times more than countries deprived of these freedoms.
Incompetency of Iran’s Politicians in Economy and a Suffering Country
Iranian politicians would be able to prevent any mistakes in the field of the economy if they would focus on the theories such as “behavioral economics” or “institutional economics”.
However, as the country’s economic situation shows, the officials seem to be illiterate in the field of economy, and the amazing thing is that they do not accept their illiteracy and make decisions that are devastating the economy more than ever. Sometimes they do not even understand simple economic issues. Many of the officials did not understand even the difference between “job opportunity” and “occupation”.
This is nothing new and can be constantly seen from Mohammad Khatami’s government to Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s to Hassan Rouhani’s and is now inherited by the new government whose president has the record of only six classes and was busy with executions and human rights violations therefore we should not expect something else than a disabled economy.
These are not hollow charges but can be seen in their many interviews and speeches. The other part of the government does not show any interest in the field of the country’s economy except the corruption and looting.
The Friday Prayer’s Imams, who are becoming the main artillery of the production of uncertainty and instability on the horizon of the country’s political economy, sometimes do not know the difference between ‘subsidies’ and ‘computers.’ (In Persian the pronunciation of these two words is close to each other “Yaraneh (Subsidies) and Rayaneh (PC)”).
Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said that he had created two million jobs annually. He was right by auctioning the country’s wealth and resources, he created many “job opportunities” but the complete amount of the “occupation” over his eight-year tenure was not even close to six months in creating “occupation” of the previous government.
From the economic situation, it can be predicted that most of the regime’s officials are not informed about the subject of “Transaction Cost” and how it is affecting the country’s economy by heating it first to the ground and secondly it will heat the political system to the ground.
And it can be assumed that the head of the judiciary as the main institution of dealing with the transaction costs has not even heard such an expression.
Now the “Transaction Cost” in Iran is so increasing that it has taken the breath of the economy and eventually has stuck it and turned Iran into an anti-development country.
If this regime would be put a little more attention on the transparency and law-abiding and protection of people’s property rights, its benefits would be more of the country’s economy, than the wasted money one road and dam creations, iron, and petrochemical industry. But all of them are the victims of institutionalized corruption.
The situation has deteriorated indescribably. If you want to know the depth of the disaster, consider this comparison:
The total value of the country’s stock exchange has been announced at around 320 trillion Tomans over the past weekend.
Estimates of last year show that about 250 trillion Tomans of the people’s assets have been grounded in the judiciary.
This estimate, of course, is accompanied by errors, as accurate information about the cases is not published by the judiciary, therefore this estimate is collected from unofficial sources.
With each economic case entering the judiciary, a portion of Iran’s national assets will be undecided until a court verdict is issued. All the costs resulting from the uncertainty of people’s assets in the judiciary are part of the ‘Transaction Cost’, and of course, all other public institutions produce more or less ‘Transaction Cost’, which now are damaging Iran’s economy.
That is not the worst part of the story; the worst part is that because of the enormous corruption combined with these uncertain and undecided ‘Transaction Costs’ there is a high amount of capital flight, and no one can predict how things will end up.
