Retail prices
Topic: Inflation and Index Numbers: CPI, WPI, IIP and the Deflator · NCERT: Class 11, Ch 2 "Collection of Data"; Class 11, Ch 7 "Index Numbers"
Meaning
Retail prices are the prices ordinary consumers pay when they buy goods and services in small quantities from shops and service providers. They are the prices a household actually faces, so they are used to measure the cost of living. In India they are collected by the NSO and tracked by the Consumer Price Index (CPI). The CPI covers services as well as goods.
Example
When onion prices at your local vegetable shop jump, the CPI records it. Food carried a weight of 45.86 in the CPI-Combined (2012 series), so such jumps quickly move India's headline retail inflation.
Don't confuse with
- Wholesale prices: bulk prices at which goods are traded between businesses, tracked by the WPI. Retail and wholesale prices differ by traders' margins, and the WPI excludes services.
- Producer prices: prices received by producers, excluding taxes, trade margins and transport.
Related concepts
- Consumer Price Index
- Basket of commodities
- CPI for Industrial Workers
- CPI for Agricultural Labourers
- CPI for Rural Labourers
- CPI for urban non-manual employees
- CPI-Rural and CPI-Urban
- CPI-Combined
- Consumer Food Price Index