price
Price is the amount of money you must hand over to get a good or service, the number where a seller's wish and a buyer's willingness finally shake hands.
In plain English
The bus conductor at Ojota shouts '200 to Ikeja, no change' and somehow, in that noisy moment, a whole economics lesson is happening on the road.
Yesterday it was ₦150. Today fuel scarcity has pushed transport costs up, and the conductor has calmly reset the number everyone must pay to get where they are going.
That number, the one you argue about, calculate in your head, or just hand over because you are in a hurry, is price. It is simply what a buyer gives up in money to get what a seller has.
Price is not fixed by anger or wishing. It moves because of what is happening around it: how much fuel costs, how many buses are on the road, how many passengers are waiting, how far the naira has fallen.
In London, a landlord raises rent on a flat in Manchester because more graduates are moving into the city for jobs. Same story, different currency. More people wanting a thing than there is of that thing to go round tends to push its price up.
For the person in Leeds sending money home, price also lives in the exchange rate. The naira value of the ₦50,000 they send changes depending on the price of naira in pounds that week, which is why timing a transfer can feel like a small gamble.
A bag of rice cost ₦42,000 in January. By June, after transport costs rose and supply tightened, the same bag sold for ₦58,000. Nothing changed about the rice itself, only the conditions around getting it to the market changed, and the price followed.
Questions people ask
Why do prices go up even when nothing seems different about the product?
Often the product is the same, but something around it has changed: the cost of fuel to transport it, the exchange rate for imported parts, or simply more buyers chasing the same amount of stock. Price reacts to all of this even when the item itself is untouched.
Is a high price always a bad sign?
Not necessarily. A high price can mean something is scarce, in demand, or costly to produce, but it can also just mean a seller is testing what buyers will accept. A useful habit is comparing prices across a few sellers before deciding a price is fair or unfair.
How is price different from value?
Price is the number on the tag. Value is what that thing is actually worth to you personally. A ₦5,000 umbrella feels priceless during a downpour and overpriced on a dry, sunny day, even though the price on the tag never moved.
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