KARACHI: These days, there is a single question that haunts Zubair Yar Khan and his wife Sobia: how to survive on a household income of Rs32,000, barely over $100, per month as Pakistan inflation rose to a record 36.4% in the year to April, triple what it was last year and the highest rate in South Asia.
Persistently high inflation has resulted in major lifestyle and consumption changes for Pakistanis, with a greater number seeking help from friends and families and even turning towards charities.
The Khans are among them, living in a 47-yard house in a low-income neighbourhood of Pakistan’s largest city of Karachi, and wondering how $87 dollars will cover their utility and food bills as well as the school fees of their three children.
The family recently changed the children’s school to lower costs, and have also reduced kitchen expenses but the food bill has still jumped to Rs16,000 from Rs9,000, putting the family in a constant monthly deficit.
Transport prices climbed 56.8% while food inflation quickened 48.1% in April from a year earlier, data showed. Clothing and footwear prices gained 21.6% and housing, water and electricity costs rose 16.9%.
Pakistan's inflation is expected to rise further after authorities raised taxes and fuel prices to meet the IMF's conditions for the revival of a $6.5 billion loan programme.
“The salary (of my husband) runs out ten days before the end of the month,” Sobia, 38, told Arab News.
The remaining ten days are a “struggle for survival,” while asking for help from friends and family has filled the couple with an “extreme sense of shame.”
“Close relatives, brothers and sisters, give support but it is embarrassing taking from them every month,” Sobia said with tears in her eyes. “But we have to, for the education of our girls.”
To supplement her husband’s Rs27,000 salary, Sobia makes earrings at home, adding approximately Rs5,000 ($16) to the family budget monthly.
The housewife said food, electricity, gas and school fees amounted to over Rs35,000 in bills, and there was nothing left over for emergencies, debt repayments or external shocks like health costs.
“I can’t even afford to cook meat more than once a month,” Sobia said.
The only resort then was to ask others for money, and get locked in a cycle of debt.
Sobia’s husband Khan, who works as a welder at a local steel unit in Karachi, said the family had to borrow Rs5,000 to Rs8,000 from relatives and friends each month, which added a future financial burden on the family.
“I had requested my company to give some salary raise after petrol price hikes, but they refused,” Khan said.
Khan earns only Rs2,000 more than the minimum wage of Rs25,000 in Sindh province. For millions of other Pakistanis, even receiving the minimum wage is a distant dream.
“About 60% (employers) are not paying minimum wage in the formal sector and I believe 90% are not paying in the informal sector,” Majyd Aziz, former president and board member of the Employers’ Federation of Pakistan (EFP), told Arab News.
“That is the ground reality and if anybody tells you that he is paying [minimum wage] he is lying.”
But Khan hoped the upcoming budget, for the fiscal year that runs from July this year to June 2024, might relieve the family’s troubles.
“Government should give us some relief through the budget, or the company should increase our salary to support us,” Khan said. “For the last two years the salary has not been increased.”
His wife was unconvinced.
“The budget comes with more burden, things would be more expensive."
Already, Sobia said, families like hers with limited means were forced to adopt a reclusive lifestyle, partially or completely isolated from their loved ones, due to the high costs associated with visiting or hosting relatives.
“These are many things that we have changed or cut down due to inflation. We don’t go out for recreational activities,” Khan said. “The difficulties have increased so much that even buying clothes for Eid is much more difficult.”
Sharjeel Memon, the information minister for Sindh, did not respond to questions seeking comment for this story.
