Workers’ Wages Now Worth Less Than a Kilo of Rice
In a stark admission of Iran’s deepening economic crisis, the state-run ILNA news agency reported on Sunday, July 20, that the minimum cost of living for a family has surged to nearly 50 million tomans per month. According to the outlet, the basic subsistence basket that was estimated at 28 million tomans in March has now crossed 48 million tomans, rapidly approaching 50 million.
ILNA’s report highlights the accelerating pace of inflation under the current regime, particularly in essential food items. The outlet noted a dramatic 70% increase in staple goods such as rice and legumes between last winter and the end of June. Even more alarming, field data showed that prices continued to climb in July, with Iranian rice alone increasing by more than 50%. The price of a single kilogram of Iranian rice jumped from 150,000–180,000 tomans to a staggering 300,000 tomans following the recent 12-day war.
The report also includes the testimony of a labor activist who described the crushing reality faced by ordinary citizens. “A worker earning 14 to 15 million tomans a month, or a retiree who gets 13 million tomans after 30 years of hard work, needs around 50 million tomans to support a family of three or four,” the activist said. “Even working two shifts, a young worker can’t make enough to cover the bare minimum living costs.”
Perhaps the most devastating acknowledgment came when ILNA bluntly stated that the wages of workers and pensioners are now less than one-third of the poverty line. “This is not an exaggeration,” the article notes, “considering that a worker’s daily minimum wage is just over 300,000 tomans — exactly the price of one kilogram of Iranian rice. In other words, a full day’s labor buys only a single kilo of plain rice.”
This rare moment of candor from a regime-affiliated media outlet paints a bleak picture of the economic collapse affecting millions of Iranian families, particularly the working class. It underscores the growing disconnect between official wage policies and the real cost of living — a gap that continues to widen amid mounting inflation and economic mismanagement.
