Financial Tribune - After having paid $194.37 million to about 17.7 million households (60 million people) in the first round of the Livelihood Assistance Program lately, the government will track the financial assets and transactions of both recipients and complainants

The government will weigh up offering earnings from higher gasoline prices to people only after monitoring their bank accounts, Ahmad Meydari, deputy minister of cooperatives, labor and social welfare, announced.

“Prior to making another payment, the government will track the financial transactions of applicants, even those who were among 60 million beneficiaries of the first round of the program," he added.

According to Oil Minister Bijan Namdar Zanganeh, the latest rationing and doubling of gasoline prices that started on Nov. 15 will increase annual government revenues by $2.5 billion that will be used exclusively for welfare spending, this time dubbed as the Livelihood Assistance Program.

In the first round of payments, the government granted 550,000 rials ($4.41) to one person households, 1.03 million rials ($8.27) for two-person families, 1.38 million rials ($11.08) for three-person households, 1.72 million rials ($13.81) for four-person households and 2.05 million rials ($16.46) to households with five or more persons.