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In think the cost of living in my country has always been so high and in recent times, everyone realized it when prices of almost everything skyrocketed at an alarming rate. The most painful thing about this is that, as things are getting more expensive day after day, this does not necessarily increase the income of people. Sometimes, I wonder how Nigerians are built, because the way we adjust to hardship needs to be studied.
Comparing my country to other countries, I will say that this issue of inflation is everywhere and everyone is going through it. However, what differentiates my country from other countries is the level of income. Imagine this, the minimum wage in my country is less than $30! What can that do for anybody in this economy?! Considering the number of things we have to cater to as individual; clothing, shelter, food, transportation, and so much more. It's obvious that the money is too little.
When I hear the prices of things in the market, I get shocked every single time. When we were young, we thought our parents had it better because money really had value during their own time. They would buy books at less than 1 Naira, they literally spent kobos! Books are like 3000 Naira upward now. Funny enough, as much as we thought things were expensive then, it's very shocking that they have become times we'd do anything to bring back.
Being able to buy one spaghetti for #70 Naira instead of #700 Naira? Or being able to buy two noodles for #50 Naira instead of #600? Or being able to pay #20 to my next bus stop again, instead of #200? Or being able to pay #50,000 for house rent again instead of the super high prices we are hearing nowadays? Trust me, we would give anything to go back to that time. The crazy thing is now that the salary that some people were collecting during the time that these prices were this low, did not exactly change. How on earth are they even surviving?
If I had the chance to go to other countries, I would really love to explore that. If I could, I would love to go any of these countries; The United States of America, United Kingdom and Italy. I am very much aware that things are costly everywhere, but at least, the system seems to work better abroad. The level of migration has been over the roof lately, and the reason is quite glaring. Also, we have access to very little benefit unlike other countries. The ratio of our earning to the basic things we need to spend it on is not even balance at all.
It is very scary, because no one know if things will eventually get better. I truly hope it does, because there is no fun in hardship at all. The government is only after their own pockets as they watch things get out of hand. It will not even be funny if things get worse than this. Really hoping it wouldn't, it's quite unbearable as it is now.
Thanks for reading ❤️