In urban India, there’s a peculiar pattern of behaviour that plays out across markets, pavements, and malls — one that reveals far more about our economic ethics than we may realize.
It begins innocuously: a shopper walks up to a roadside fruit vendor and, upon hearing that a dozen bananas cost ₹80, counters with ₹50. After a few minutes of haggling, the deal is struck at ₹60. The buyer walks away satisfied, having “saved” ₹20. Moments later, the same person pays ₹3,000 for a shirt in a mall without question, even topping it up with ₹50 for a plastic bag branded with the retailer’s logo.
The discrepancy is not just economic; it is moral, psychological, and social. This behaviour is not about affordability. It is about perceived legitimacy and status.
We instinctively bargain with those who cannot afford to lose a customer — the street vendor, the auto driver, the flower seller. We rarely negotiate with the salaried cashier at a branded outlet, even when we know the markup is excessive. The belief is simple but flawed: the informal seller’s price must be negotiated because it’s likely inflated; the formal sector’s price is final because it is “standard.”
But look closer. The vendor’s margins are thin, often no more than a few rupees. They have no brand cushion, no salaried marketing team, no fixed premises. Their working hours are long, their access to credit limited, and their vulnerability to risk high. When we bargain with them over ₹10 or ₹20, we are directly affecting their subsistence. That same amount, for most urban middle-class buyers, is often less than the cost of their daily coffee.
Yet, when faced with excessive charges from organized retail — whether it is ₹180 for bottled water at a multiplex, or a ₹75 “convenience fee” on a ticketing app — we comply. We may complain, but we rarely resist. The power dynamics have shifted. We know we have no leverage in those transactions.
What this reveals is not just consumer behaviour, but a larger discomfort with how we assign value and respect. We view the poor as negotiable. We view the rich and organized as fixed. In doing so, we reinforce a structure where the poor must constantly prove their worth, while the privileged are trusted without scrutiny.
This bias extends beyond pricing. A cobbler charging ₹100 for a repair job is seen as overcharging. A luxury brand charging ₹800 for leather shoe polishing is “premium service.” The informal worker’s labour is invisible unless it is cheap. Formal markets don’t just benefit from structure — they benefit from our silence.
There’s also an unspoken asymmetry of power. Street vendors rarely argue back. They need the sale. Their lack of bargaining power becomes our leverage. But this isn’t negotiation in the true economic sense — it is assertion of dominance in a socially unequal interaction.
This behaviour sits uncomfortably alongside the rise in urban concern about inequality, social justice, and inclusion. Many who speak against corporate profiteering or wealth disparity still resist paying a coconut vendor ₹5 more. The contradiction is evident: we are willing to pay a premium for brand and ambience, but not for human effort and survival.
The moral burden here is subtle but significant. When we underpay the already underpaid, we participate in deepening the very inequality we critique. When we overpay the already overcompensated, we reinforce their advantage. And when we justify this as “how markets work,” we overlook the fact that not all participants in the market enter with equal agency.
There is no public policy needed to correct this. What is required is individual reflection. As consumers, we must ask: why do we apply scrutiny selectively? Why do we demand accountability from those who have the least? And why do we normalize excess from those who have the most?
The change begins with behaviour. Don’t bargain with those who rely on every rupee to get by. If you can, pay more. Let the auto driver keep the change. Round up the vegetable vendor’s payment. Tip the cobbler. Not as charity, but as fairness. As economic dignity.
In a country where informal livelihoods form the economic backbone, how we treat these everyday transactions matters. They are not just exchanges of goods and money. They are reflections of what we value — and who we respect.
