What impact has the goods and services tax (GST), the new system of taxation that consolidates a multitude of Central and state taxes in one place, had on the urban household shopping budget?
In order to answer this question, we collated prices of goods that make up an average middle-class shopping cart, on two days: 30 June (the evening before GST was rolled out) and on 1 July (the day GST rolled out).
We sourced prices from the Big Basket website for 71 items covering 18 categories of the Consumer Price Index (CPI), of which GST was applicable on 47 items, for the five main metros.
The early net impact: you gain some, you lose some, but overall not much change.
On the maximum retail price (MRP), or the list price of goods, the total cost of this basket of 47 GST-eligible items fell in three of the five cities, with the highest savings being in Chennai (of 0.9%, on a bill value of Rs7,364). The highest increase was in Delhi, of 0.44%.
On the actual selling price, which factors in the discounts given by a retailer, the total cost of our basket of 47 items increased in four of the five cities, with Mumbai showing the maximum increase (of 1.58%). This suggests lower discounts as compared to the pre-GST rates.
In the average monthly shopping basket after GST, there wasn’t much change in the price of goods in the 5 main metros.
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