New possibilities for nontraditional revenue streams!
Posted on 08/05/2015 7:55:21 PM PDT by TigerLikesRooster
'Grasshoppers' make Pyongyang tick
published Aug 5, 2015, 5:00 am SGT
North Korea's tough market rules forcing small traders to become illegal street vendors
SEOUL • From the dark alleys of Pyongyang, the showpiece North Korean capital, tiny specks of torchlight shine carefully into the eyes of passers-by, leading to bustling and illegal street markets where traders, usually women, call out: "Buy, buy!"
The maeddugi shijang, or "grasshopper markets", get their name from the lightning-quick way traders must pack up and hop from place to place to evade the authorities in a country making a grudging embrace of free enterprise.
As markets take hold in North Korea, the government has sporadically legalised and formalised them, while at the same time imposing new crackdowns, taxes and bribes, forcing smaller traders to set up "grasshopper markets" selling goods for cash.
"The grasshopper markets form in places near stations, on the roads to the (official) market and around schools and parks," said Mr Seol Song Ah, a defector who left North Korea in 2011 and now works with the Daily NK, a Seoul-based website with sources in the North. "Wherever there are people, there are grasshopper markets."
These markets are less well- stocked than official shops but offer convenience, carrying items from pots, socks, batteries and cigarettes to fresh meat, according to residents of Pyongyang and defectors from the isolated country.
(Excerpt) Read more at straitstimes.com ...
P!
“grasshopper markets”
Capitalism is insidious, isn’t it. It just happens to work to the benefit of all everywhere.
When your official job buys a kilo of rice a month and you often have to give money to your boss that you don’t have, you’d better have another way to make a living.
I love the headlines to some of these stories.
I thought;
A) People were selling Grasshoppers to eat because they are starving, or
B) Fat Boy Kim was claiming Grasshoppers were working for the glorious party making watches or something.
Resist they much.
The most common complaint of N. Koreans is “Leave us alone.”
“Ah grasshoppah ... respect the ways of others. Accept first your own. And always remembah—man with forked tongue should not kiss balloons.”
Mastah Po
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