Budget 2023-24: The forgotten middle-class, again

The Rs4.5 trillion federal budget did little to ease the backbreaking economic pressures on middle-class families in Pakistan. People are still struggling to digest the meteoric rise in a short span of time and the fast fall of the PTI that captured the imaginations of many as a glimmer of hope for the future. This was at the top of the crippling economic distress that stagflation mounted on average households in Pakistan. Even if there was a growth of 0.3 per cent, as the current Pakistan Economic Survey claims, it didn’t feel like that over the last year when inflation broke all records, currency value tanked, and the unemployment level hiked. Most normal average households landed lower on the social ladder in the course of the year. The runaway inflation of 30pc and more, with static income and squeezed avenues of supplementary support, made managing family budgets hard. It forced many to scale down spending on rent by shifting to smaller spaces or to localities with relatively economical housing, shifting children to cheaper schools, limiting health spending, cutting on comforts and, in extreme cases, selling family silver or borrowing to stem the living standards. Many ended up deeper in debt.