Buying Power Ebbs
Costa Rican workers get more money every time; however, they are able to buy less and less food with it.

While wages increased by 9.3% in the year that ended March 2005, the Consumer Price Index - which includes 264 basic products - went up 13.6% in the same period.

Real income is the true measure of buying power because it excludes inflation, analysts say, and for workers of the private sector it went 2.7 percent down in the period analyzed.