I might not have an idea about other places but in my country here in Nigeria, prices of goods and commodities are like the waves of the sea. At times it upgrades from been waves to become a storm that might attempt in killing the consumers if care is not taken.
I was opportune to be part of a discussion someday. Two women just came back from Mile12 (Mile12 is a big popular market that is well known in Lagos state, Nigeria both from the local side or the civilized part of lagos. It's a centralized market that has been existing for ages) and they were talking about how their journey went for the day in the market.
They got to the market at evening time and price of the crate of tomatoes they wanted to get was given at 8,000. She explained how she was complaining that it was expensive and not supposed to reach that price and left there. Only to meet some load carriers and from one discussion that led to the other, they got to know that, the same crate of tomatoes in same market on the same day was still sold at the rate of 20,000 naira and least price of 18,000 during the day.
Now! Here is the question ❓ What happened to the cost of tomatoes in few minutes between the day and evening? No new market was brought in but still same pepper that was sold in the morning and afternoon but because there's no rule to apprehend anyone selling any particular product or goods at an outrageous inflated price, every sellers felt the right to do and undo.
We cant say there's no body to call these sellers to order because they are all operating under a market rulling system, of which based on the example I gave above, you cant leave seller's A store to seller's B store to meet a different price. If at all there's going to be, then its just gonna be a very tiny difference which means it's a kind of decision which the market cordinators too are aware of.
This makes it worse for someone who now have that audacity to collect money from someone to get something you once bought for a cheap price and then you come back to tell the person that price has changed.
It is more worse if you're now living in an environment where the road that leads there is still under construction and it gets rough to take when rain falls. Price of rickshaw (which we refer to as keke marwa) catapults from its original price to like 3times of the original price and if you're someone who only went out based on luck of exact transportation fare then you might end up trekking home or turning a corporate begger just to get home because there's no regulation to hold them accountable for that act of inflating the price from the normal price.
The most annoying part is that whatever goods price that goes up here in my country won't ever come back to that initial price which would enforce the consumers to adapt to getting it continuously at that new price.
Having Price cap in businesses seem like a great idea but the fact remains that it won't work in a system like ours where rules of such can even be broken by the regulatory bodies themselves as long as they're getting a cut from the returns. Every business owners feels the right of ownership to do and undo even when they can't survive on their own without the consumers or customers.
Most handwork or artisans are not guided by any regulations and we can always bill however we want which is not really right.
Even if at all there should be change in price due to the cost and expenses of running our businesses due to the environment (for instance businesses on the Island side of Lagos and Mainland) then it shouldn't be much or so outrageous.
Reasonable profit making should be considered instead of exhibiting an **"I don't care"** act to the public.
Just like I would always say, government is not always the center of all our problems as citizens. We also take a large share of inflicting problems on ourselves as the grassroot.
Government isn't the one inflating price from the early morning price to the new price at afternoon and resetting back to normal price late in the evening.
Price Cap is a reasonable means of having regularized market prices but I just feel like it can't work in a system like ours OR do you think it can work?
I will be dropping my 🖊️ here on the Hive Learners community prompt.
Thank you for reading through 🤗
All images are Mine.