A survey conducted by the İstanbul Planning Agency (IPA) has revealed that the cost of living in Turkey’s most populous city increased by 78.48 percent in November compared to the same month of 2022.
The IPA, which was established in 2020 under the İstanbul Metropolitan Municipality, calculated the cost of living in İstanbul for a family of four to be TL 47.493 ($1,640) in November, an increase of TL 1.537 ($53) in comparison to October.
The product that saw the highest increase in price annually was olives, at 173.59 percent, while the price of chicken meat saw an increase of 113.5 percent.
More than 40 percent of Turkey’s workforce earns the minimum wage allowed by law, which was set by the government this year at TL 11,402 ($394).
Turkey is suffering the worst bout of inflation of President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s two-decade rule. The official annual inflation rate peaked at 85 percent in October of last year.
After winning re-election in May, Erdoğan appointed a new team of market-friendly economists that was given the freedom to sharply hike its policy rate.
Turkey’s annual inflation stood at 61.98 percent in November, the Turkish Statistical Institute (TurkStat) said on Monday, showing further signs of levelling off following a series of sharp interest rate hikes by the new economic team.
Analysts blamed Erdoğan for setting off the inflation spiral by forcing the nominally independent central bank to slash borrowing costs far below the rate at which prices were rising.