Just top 20 per cent of consumers are driving demand: report

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That the rich got richer during the pandemic has become more evident with research data showing just 20 per cent of the population are leading the discretionary consumption wagon, as the rest are still recovering.

The pandemic has not impacted affluent consumers' income levels in the country is clear from the fact that the top 20 per cent of the population account for the bulk of discretionary consumption--59 per cent in rural areas and 66 per cent in urban areas, Tanvee Gupta-Jain, chief economist at UBS Securities India, said in a report.

Citing an in-house UBS survey (conducted in August among 1,500 higher-income consumers) results, she says more than half of the respondents have bought gold/jewellery as planned or more in the past three months and more than half of them planning to invest in properties and buying cars/two-wheelers over the next two years.

According to a UBS analysis, during the pandemic, the formal sector gained market share at the cost of the informal economy as the rich continued to increase their spending on branded goods through online shopping, healthcare, online entertainment, and household consumables like groceries, food, etc.

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