Iran’s deputy labor minister says two million jobs have been lost as war damage, port disruption and an internet blackout hit factories and services.
Iran’s deputy work and social security minister says two million people have lost their jobs because of the war with the U.S. and Israel, a sign that the conflict’s economic damage is spreading well beyond sites hit by airstrikes.
The warning comes as a weakly captured live-update summary from CBS News, distributed through Google News, described the U.S. and Iran as still locked in a standoff in the Strait of Hormuz and said Israel had launched new strikes in Lebanon. The same summary pointed to uncertainty around U.S.-Iran ceasefire efforts, but the underlying live article was not captured in full, leaving those developments supported only at headline-summary level in the supplied material.
The strongest available reporting in the source bundle comes from the BBC, which says Iran is seeing a broad wave of redundancies across manufacturing, retail, import-export businesses and the digital sector. Gholamhossein Mohammadi, Iran’s deputy work and social security minister, said two days earlier that two million people had lost work because of the war.
Employers and officials have referred to the layoffs as “balancing the workforce,” according to the BBC. On Iranian social media, users have described emptier metros, easier parking near offices and unusually light traffic on Tehran’s Hemmat highway as signs of how many people are no longer commuting.
The job losses are not limited to factories damaged in attacks. The BBC reported that U.S. and Israeli strikes in late March and early April hit major petrochemical plants in Asaluyeh and Mahshahr, as well as large steel manufacturers including Mobarakeh Steel and Khuzestan Steel. Tens of thousands of people lost jobs directly, while many more work in supply chains tied to those industries.
Disruption in the Strait of Hormuz has added another pressure point. One manufacturing executive in Qom told the BBC that production had stopped because materials could not be secured: “We were hoping that when the war stopped, things would go back to normal. But we cannot even get the material loaded on the ship, as our foreign suppliers are worried that the ship won’t be permitted to enter the Iranian waters.”
Iran’s large car industry, estimated in the BBC report to directly or indirectly employ about one million people, is among the sectors exposed to the shortage of materials and supply-chain disruption. A social media user cited by the BBC said a textile company had fired 600 of 650 workers because it could no longer import raw material from Australia.
The conflict has also hit consumer demand. With many households cutting spending to essentials, tourism, restaurants and non-grocery retailers have faced reduced business. Some companies are reportedly promising to rehire workers when conditions improve, while others have pushed employees onto unpaid leave.
Iran’s internet blackout has deepened the damage, especially for the digital economy. Officials have said the shutdown was imposed for security reasons, including concerns about surveillance, espionage and cyberattacks. But the BBC reported that the blackout has harmed online businesses and female earners who relied on platforms such as Instagram to reach customers.
Iran’s information and communication technology minister, Sattar Hashemi, said in January that each day of an internet blackout cost the economy at least 50 trillion rials, or about $35 million. By the BBC’s count, 52 days of shutdown since the start of the war would amount to more than $1.8 billion in losses. The available source bundle also flagged an extracted figure discrepancy, but the captured article text supports the 50 trillion-rial daily figure.
The government has announced a small-business loan scheme of 440 million rials per worker, described by the BBC as less than $300, repayable within six months at interest rates of 18% to 35%, depending on how many redundancies a firm makes.
The layoffs are landing as Iran’s official inflation rate has passed 50%, according to the BBC. If the war resumes or sanctions remain tight, the economic strain could intensify, with the next phase likely to depend on whether ceasefire efforts, the Strait of Hormuz standoff and regional strikes move toward de-escalation or further disruption.
Comments (0)