A hike in fuel prices: How will it affect the common man?

A daunting thought; fuel prices in Pakistan are likely to see a hike starting November 1^st. If news sources are to be believed, we’ll have petrol climb up 9.1 PKR while high speed diesel will see a hike of up to Rs13 per litre.

Because we’re the common people, the awaam, what affects us is the hike in price, not the reason why the prices are being prescribed such a significant climb. Keeping aside all the bigger terms of micro or macroeconomics, lets just get to the point. Higher fuel prices will definitely result in a hike for gasoline price as well. And since, a common man, actually functions on gasoline (read petrol/CNG) a large part of the monthly income of an average person is likely to be spent on it, leaving very less for other things.

The same will apply to all businesses which require their products to be shipped from one place to another. Higher fuel prices will definitely make production more expensive therefore making every item, from a toothbrush to your regular milk, expensive.

And so for a common man, we’ll be expecting a huge dent in our day to day expenditure and savings of the monthly budget. Higher cost of grocery bills, increased price in day to day necessary items, especially food, clothes, eating out, leisurely activities, everything is bound to be impacted. And if you travel by public transport, say hello to saving less than what you actually thought about!

And that’s not it. Be it foreign travel, trade or even education, a rise in feul prices will see the cost of just about everything rising up. We will see pressure on the external accounts resulting in the cost of imported producted go up. The exchange rate (which is already at an all time low) will further be affected, making affording foreign travel or education abroad very difficult.

An official announcement for the implementation of the new prices will be made after consultation with the PM. However, we urge you to brace yourself for the impact and rejig your finances because the government itself has very limited options when it comes to preventing the fuel prices to go up.