IQBAL works as a driver with a rent-a-car company. He is usually working six to seven days a week. The company pays him around Rs30,000 as salary. He does make some more as overtime, and though that amount varies by the month, on average he gets another Rs20,000 or so. Adding tips to the total, he makes around Rs65,000 per month. He has a wife and two children who are still in school.

Up to a couple of years ago, Iqbal was able to save a bit every month from his income. But the inflation over the last few years has made his budget a lot more constrained. He is barely able to meet all his routine expenses now. Electricity and gas bills have increased a lot. And the food bill has also almost doubled. He is actively on the lookout for extra driving jobs now so that he can get more overtime payment. He has started skipping lunch unless a client is generous enough to give him lunch or money for lunch.

This is not an isolated case. In their article (‘People are eating less’) in this paper last week, Zafar Mirza and Miftah Ismail, giving numbers from the Household Integrated Expenditure Survey 2024-25, have shown that people are indeed eating less and they have had to tighten their belts further to make ends meet. And this is true for not just lower-income groups but middle-income groups as well.

What has made life a lot harder for Iqbal and his family has been a health shock. His wife has blood pressure and........

© Dawn