New inflation record in Turkey – Erdogan makes another massive mistake
Created: 05/10/2022, 16:48
By: Lisa Mayerhofer
Inflation in Turkey has reached staggering highs, food prices have risen by more than 90 percent.
President Erdogan still wants to lower interest rates further.
Ankara – According to experts, inflation in the euro zone is likely to be ten percent in September.
Turkey can only dream of this: inflation there has reached a new high.
Annual inflation was 83.45 percent in September, the National Bureau of Statistics said in Ankara on Monday.
Food prices had risen by a good 93 percent.
In August, consumer prices were 80.21 percent higher than in the same month last year.
Erdogan continues to fuel inflation in Turkey
Inflation in Turkey was a good 80 percent in August.
This was the highest level in 24 years.
Actually, according to economic doctrine, significant interest rate increases would be announced.
Unlike most central banks, such as the ECB, the Turkish central bank is not reacting to high inflation by raising interest rates, but by lowering interest rates.
Because the Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is still in favor of lowering the key interest rate.
The key interest rate must be brought to a single-digit value by the end of the year, Erdogan said on Wednesday evening, according to the Anadolu news agency.
The Turkish President has long blocked interest rate hikes because he wants to use low interest rates to further stimulate the economy in his country.
In doing so, however, he fuels inflation and thus immense price increases, from which the Turkish population has to suffer.
High food prices and inflation in Turkey: "It's just not enough"
60 percent of employees in Turkey work in the low-wage sector, many of them at the minimum wage.
This was recently increased by 30 percent - after it was raised by 50 percent at the beginning of the year.
But this can lead to a wage-price spiral that only fuels inflation.
In addition, a Turkish car mechanic complained in a
ZDF
report that the prices for goods had risen so much that the wage increases would not help much.
"No matter where you look, everything has gotten more expensive again," the man complains to
ZDF
, "it's not enough at all." For Erdogan, that should be a warning signal - there are elections next year and the people are in Turkey Dissatisfied: According to the Metropoll survey institute, less than half of those surveyed are satisfied with the work of the President - and the trend is falling.
(lma/AFP)
