Economic sanctions, often promoted as precise tools to influence ruling elites without harming ordinary citizens, consistently inflict significant hardship on vulnerable populations, according to recent research analyzing their effects on Iran. The findings challenge the commonly held belief that sanctions are both effective and ethically justifiable instruments of foreign policy.
The U.S.-led sanctions imposed in 2012, which excluded Iranian banks from the global financial network for the first time on such a scale, have been closely examined using detailed household data. The study reveals that these financial restrictions disproportionately impacted low-income families, who lost between 2.3 and 2.8 times more of their real purchasing power compared to wealthier households. On average, Iranian families experienced a decline in purchasing power ranging from 13% to 42%, highlighting the regressivity of financial sanctions.
The mechanics behind this disparity lie in how cutting off access to the global payments system disrupts the ability of a country to import goods and maintain foreign currency reserves. This disruption drives inflation, particularly in prices of imported consumer products, which tend to weigh heavily on everyday households. Wealthier individuals often have access to diversified assets and informal financial networks, enabling them to mitigate the impact, while low-income households absorb the full brunt of price increases.
The effects vary across employment sectors. Public-sector workers, whose wages often fail to keep pace with inflation, were among the hardest hit, requiring 35% to 41% more compensation than private-sector employees to sustain their pre-sanctions living standards. Workers in manufacturing and service industries also suffered disproportionately compared to those in agriculture and construction due to these sectors’ reliance on imported inputs.
These consequences translate into tangible reductions in nutrition, healthcare access, and educational opportunities for millions who have no direct role in the geopolitical conflicts motivating the sanctions. Despite the intention of pressuring governments, authoritarian regimes frequently shield elites from economic pain while it is ordinary citizens—teachers, nurses, civil servants—who endure steep declines in living standards.
Critics of sanctions often argue these measures are necessary alternatives to military action. However, alternatives such as diplomatic isolation, targeted asset freezes, visa bans on elites, and international legal mechanisms may impose less harm on civilian populations. Unlike armed conflict, where international law enforces principles limiting civilian harm, economic sanctions lack comparable humanitarian safeguards or proportionality standards, allowing widespread suffering to continue with limited accountability.
The authors of the study call for greater recognition of the human costs sanctions impose. They argue that if bombing civilian infrastructure is prohibited due to foreseeable harm, economic measures that deprive vulnerable populations of significant income should be subject to similar ethical scrutiny. Policymakers have available tools to measure the effects on populations with precision but have yet to apply humanitarian standards equivalently to economic coercion.
The research underscores the need to balance foreign policy aims with the obligation to prevent undue suffering among civilians in sanctioned countries, including major economies like Iran. Without changes that minimize civilian harm and enforce accountability, the narrative of sanctions as a morally superior alternative to military force remains questionable.