Soaring inflation, unaffordable rents and rising healthcare and education costs are pushing millions of Iranians from poverty toward a daily struggle for survival.
Iran’s economic crisis has reached a point where millions of families are no longer struggling simply with higher prices. They are being forced to choose which basic necessities they can afford and which they must sacrifice.
Rising food prices, soaring rents, and the growing costs of healthcare and education have combined to push the country’s cost-of-living crisis into a new and more dangerous phase. For many families, paying for housing means cutting food consumption; paying medical expenses means postponing education costs; and keeping children in school can require sending them into the streets to work.
A recent report by Iran’s ILNA news agency on the lives of women street vendors in southern Tehran offers a stark illustration of this reality. One woman in Darvazeh Ghar said her monthly rent had risen from 100 million to 200 million rials, while her family had gone six months without eating meat. Another woman said she and her husband worked until 11 p.m., yet their landlord had increased the rent on their small home from 150 million to 250 million rials. Another family had been forced to send its children onto the streets to help earn money for rent.
These are not affluent neighborhoods. Darvazeh Ghar and the Shush area are among Tehran’s lower-income districts. When even these traditionally cheaper areas become unaffordable, it demonstrates how far the housing crisis has penetrated Iran’s poorest communities.
Poverty Beyond the Poverty Line
Determining a single poverty-line figure for Iran is difficult because living costs vary considerably between Tehran, other major cities, and smaller towns. The government also does not regularly publish updated official poverty-line figures.
Estimates based on data from the regime’s Parliamentary Research Center put Iran’s poverty rate at 30.1 percent in 2023, meaning roughly one-third of the population was unable to meet basic needs, according to Eghtesad Online.
The situation has almost certainly deteriorated as inflation has accelerated. Recent estimates put Tehran’s relative poverty line for a household above 600 million rials per month, while some media reports estimate that a family needs at least 900 million rials monthly simply to remain financially afloat. Differences reflect varying household sizes and calculation methods, but all point to the same conclusion: the gap between wages and the actual cost of living has become enormous.
The misery index reinforces this picture. Based on Statistical Center data and calculations published by Zoomit, Iran’s misery index reached 74.2 points in winter 2025–26, its highest level in five years. Inflation accounted for 66.6 points and unemployment for 7.6.
This means that having a job no longer guarantees economic security. Inflation can destroy the real value of wages faster than incomes can rise.
Inflation Is Shrinking the Family Table
The deterioration is particularly visible in food consumption.
According to the secretary of Iran’s Association of Meat and Protein Packaging Industries, red-meat consumption fell by approximately 50 percent in 2025. The decline occurred despite domestic production being capable of supplying the market, indicating that the problem is increasingly one of purchasing power rather than availability.
Families are simply unable to buy what they once considered ordinary food.
When meat, dairy products, fruit and other nutritious foods disappear from household budgets, the consequences extend beyond hunger. Poor nutrition can contribute to childhood malnutrition, declining physical capacity among workers, and increased vulnerability to disease. In turn, those health problems create additional medical expenses that impoverished families may also be unable to afford.
Recent figures cited by Bourse Press put annual inflation at approximately 69 percent, with year-on-year inflation at 89 percent and point-to-point food inflation exceeding 127 percent.
Because wages generally change only periodically while prices rise continuously, households effectively lose purchasing power month after month.
Housing, Healthcare and Education Become Sacrifices
Housing has become one of the largest burdens on household budgets. Statistical Center data indicate that housing accounted for approximately 43.7 percent of urban household expenditure in recent years. For low-income renters, particularly in Tehran, the actual burden can be considerably higher.
Families unable to afford rising rents are increasingly pushed toward overcrowded accommodation, deteriorating buildings, informal settlements, the outskirts of cities, or living with relatives. This creates a form of hidden homelessness: people may still have a roof over their heads, but they no longer have secure, stable and adequate housing.
Healthcare is another area where families are forced to cut back. Reports from Iran’s health sector indicate that direct household payments may account for 55 to 70 percent of healthcare costs, far above the approximately 30 percent target established in official policy documents.
As medical expenses rise, people postpone doctor visits, diagnostic tests, medicines and treatment. Delayed treatment can ultimately make illnesses more severe—and more expensive to treat.
Education is suffering from the same process. Although public education is legally supposed to be free, families still face substantial costs for uniforms, school supplies, transportation, digital devices, supplementary classes and school-related payments.
The Parliamentary Research Center previously estimated that more than 911,000 children were out of school in the 2021–22 academic year, approximately 17 percent higher than in 2015–16.
Poverty That Reproduces Itself
The most damaging aspect of the crisis is that these sacrifices are interconnected.
When parents cannot afford housing, children may be pushed into street work. When families cut food consumption, health problems increase. When healthcare becomes unaffordable, illness can reduce a worker’s ability to earn income. When children leave school to help support their families, their future employment opportunities shrink.
Poverty is therefore no longer simply a shortage of money. It is becoming a mechanism that progressively strips families of food security, housing stability, healthcare and education while reproducing deprivation from one generation to the next.
The Iranian regime’s failure to contain inflation, protect household purchasing power, provide affordable housing, and maintain effective social protections has left millions facing an increasingly stark choice—not between a better and worse standard of living, but between different forms of deprivation.
For a growing portion of Iran’s population, the struggle is no longer about living well. It is about finding a way to survive.