Claim: A study shows that street vendors in Pakistan earn more than people with ‘regular jobs’.
Fact: The claim is false as the study it refers to does not make any comparison between the income of street vendors and that of people with more regulated or formal employment.
Between 21 and 24 October 2024, a spate of posts went viral on social media, including Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, and X (formerly Twitter), claiming that a study has found that street vendors earn more on average than people with ‘regular jobs’ in Pakistan.
These posts did not clearly indicate what was meant by “regular jobs,” with a few using alternative terms like “traditional employment” and “9-5 jobs.”
Fact or Fiction?
Conducting a Google search for this claim using the keywords “street vendor,” “Pakistan,” and “earn,” Soch Fact Check found that this claim initially surfaced online in 2022. These posts can be seen here, here, and here on X.
Moreover, a number of posts on Facebook and Instagram from 2022 and 2024 feature images that also claim that street vendors earn more than people in traditional occupations. Some of these posts can be seen here, here, and here. Furthermore, two articles also feature the claim in their headlines, but do not mention it in the main bodies of their texts, which can be seen here and here.
Both the articles reference a study titled “Revitalization of the Pakistani Street Economy.”
A Google search led Soch Fact Check to a study titled “Revitalization of the Pakistani Street Economy: The Case of Islamabad,” published as “The Socio-economic Analysis of the Street Economy in the Twin Cities of Pakistan” in the RASTA Special Issue of The Pakistan Development Review in 2022. The article is written by Nasir Iqbal, Saima Nawaz, and Muhammad Aqeel Anwar. RASTA (Research for Social Transformation and Advancement) is a social science research network that is managed by the Pakistan Institute of Development Economics, Islamabad.
According to the article, the “average monthly revenue of street vendors is Rs. 114,708”. As this same figure has been quoted by many of the posts on social media from 2024 and 2022, including here, here, here, and here, we concluded that the study being referred to is, in fact, “Revitalization of the Pakistani Street Economy: The Case of Islamabad”.
It should be noted that the article in The Pakistan Development Review makes no mention of “regular” jobs or the income generated from them, other than on pages 338–39, which stated that “most of the SVs [street vendors] had low education and hence, had less chance of getting a job in formal sectors of the economy.”
Neither does it draw comparisons between the incomes generated by people working “regular” jobs and those in the street vending occupation, nor does it offer up-to-date information regarding the current financial happenings in the street vending market. As it was published in 2022, equivalents of prices in Pakistani rupees are reported in US Dollars, and the authors mention on page 344 (in the note beneath Table 3) that the exchange rate they used for this study was “1 US$ = PKR 155.” However, today 1 US$ = PKR 277.79.
Moreover, the posts and articles, from both 2022 and 2024, claim that street vendors across the country earn more than people with “regular”—non-street vending—jobs. However, the article only analyses information about street vendors and their businesses in the cities of Islamabad and Rawalpindi and not across the country. As stated by the authors on page 338, their “analysis is based on primary survey data, called the “PIDE Street Economy Survey (PSES)”, conducted in twin cities, namely, Islamabad and Rawalpindi.”
Furthermore, the figure of Rs 114,708 (which equals US$ 740 according to the exchange rate used in the study) is quoted by social media posts as the average monthly salary of a street vendor in Pakistan. While the figure of 114,708 is corroborated by the article in The Pakistan Development Review, the posts neglect the full picture behind this figure. On page 344, the authors note that apart from “input costs (for raw materials and other services)…a street vendor pays around US$ 107 monthly as an operational cost.”
The claim also neglects to mention that the illegal status of the majority of street vending businesses often results in eviction and economic loss for vendors. The authors shed light on this on page 347, stating that “98 percent of SVs [street vendors] were operating without legal protection in the market.” When street vendors did apply for licences, it “induced the local administration to confiscate the material and evict the street vendors.” Approximately “65 percent of street vendors” claimed that their confiscated material was not returned to them, and a one-time eviction “led to almost two months’ net profit loss for the SVs [street vendors].” The total “economic loss due to confiscation” ranged between “US$ 497” and “US$ 334,” depending on the locality. Hence, according to the study, street vendors and their businesses are often the subject of “massive exploitation by the local administration.”
The viral posts do not provide a full picture of the study, and they also do not clarify which jobs they exactly refer to by “regular jobs,” “traditional employment,” or “9-5 jobs.” No income is quoted for these jobs either, making it unclear as to what the average salary of a street vendor (Rs 114,708) is being compared to.
Virality
On Facebook, the claim was found here and here.
On Facebook and Instagram, posts featuring the claim only in their pictures can be seen here, here, and here.
On Instagram, the claim was found here, here, and here.
On X, the claim was found here, here, here, and here.
On TikTok, the claim was found here.
Conclusion: The study does not show that street vendors in Pakistan earn more than people in “regular” occupations. In fact, it makes no mention of regular jobs or the income generated from them, and neither does it draw any comparison between the income of street vendors with those of people with regular jobs. The study was also published in 2022 and, therefore, does not apply to 2024. Moreover, the post itself is misleading as it does not define what “regular jobs” are or their average monthly income.
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Background image in cover photo: squarespace
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