Iranians rushed to buy fuel and food this week, signaling mounting economic pressure as the Trump administration’s threat to tighten sanctions sparked fears of deeper shortages and pain.

Small demonstrations by labor unions—which had all but disappeared during the war—are popping up across the country. Oil workers, pensioners and teachers have gathered to complain about the declining currency and rising cost of living.

Those same issues triggered protests that rocked the regime around the new year, leading to a brutal crackdown that killed thousands. While the government tolerates a measure of protest around economic issues as a safety valve for anger, some of the gatherings have hit political notes despite the risks.

On Monday, offshore oil and gas workers protested in the energy hub of Asaluyeh, saying workers who keep production running shouldn’t be facing a livelihood crisis or struggling to pay rent, the semiofficial news agency ILNA said.

The previous day, about 100 laid-off workers had been demonstrating against their dismissal at the Shadegan steel complex in western Iran.

The U.S. is hoping to leverage such sentiments to put pressure on Iran’s leaders to cut a deal to reopen the Strait of Hormuz and end the war on more favorable terms.

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said Monday that countries and companies that do business with Tehran will face the wrath of the administration. The threats came as war damage, a U.S. Navy blockade and tightened sanctions are already pressuring Iran’s spiraling economy.Many analysts say the tactics will pummel Iran’s population but aren’t likely to move its leaders, who have weathered tough sanctions for years and feel they are fighting an existential war. They are implementing rationing and diverting resources from investments to hold out.

The U.S. also faces economic pressure. Bessent said he was avoiding acting immediately because he didn’t want to shake the global economy.

Conditions are clearly deteriorating in Iran. Long queues formed outside fuel stations in the capital and other cities. Some outlets ran out of motor fuel, residents and officials said.

Drivers have rushed to fill their tanks ahead of a planned reduction in quotas for subsidized fuel. Iranians have access to some of the world’s cheapest gasoline, in some cases paying less than a penny a quart. But the government is planning to ration supplies after refineries were struck during the war and amid concerns fuel imports may be cut by new sanctions.

Iran’s fuel production can’t cover its domestic needs, making it vulnerable to the new U.S. sanctions push, said Hamid Hosseini, spokesman for Iran’s oil-exporting union. Supplies come from Belarus, Turkmenistan and Kazakhstan, he said.

This week, some supermarkets in Tehran temporarily ran out of cooking oil and rice as shoppers scooped them for hoarding, residents said.

The government insists it has enough basic commodities to last for months. But the U.S. decision to tighten restrictions on Iran’s international trade is already having a psychological impact. The country brings in a lot of rice from India through the United Arab Emirates, which last week said it was severing trade ties with Iran.

“There was hysteria and, in some neighborhoods, customers rushed to supermarkets,” a translator in Tehran said. “The risk of shortage tied to U.S. sanctions threats has triggered panic.”

Supplies were more available online and in more upscale markets.

The country’s fast-declining currency is putting pressure on consumers to use it before it weakens further. On Monday, Iran’s currency fell to a record low of more than two million to the dollar, down 7% on the week and buying half as many dollars as a year ago.

Many consumers are now taking on new debt to cover basic living costs. Meat is often bought on credit, repaid in installments with interest, residents said.

“This phenomenon is not a new payment method; it is a sign of a major change: poverty,” wrote Etemad, a reformist newspaper.

Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian and parliamentary speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf said the country needs to focus on ending the war and shoring up its crippled economy. Hard-line leaders, however, are setting a high bar for a deal, seeking to raise the cost of the war for the U.S.

Iranian officials worry a deepening economic crisis could lead to a return of the unrest. In 2019, cuts to fuel and food subsidies after President Trump tightened sanctions in his first term triggered months of deadly mass protests.

In December, bazaar merchants protesting a sharp drop in the currency sparked waves of demonstrations with calls to topple the regime. Despite government warnings that protesters could be killed, localized industrial actions continue to take place.

Demonstrators in strategic industries like telecommunications and petrochemicals have carried out sit-ins over months of unpaid wages.

Earlier in August, 32 petrochemical workers in Bandar-e Mahshahr, a city on the Persian Gulf coast, publicly protested their dismissals, according to ILNA.

Members of the Coordination Council of Iranian Teachers’ Trade Associations—a teachers union—are tying Iran’s deteriorating economic conditions to its leaders’ uncompromising posture.

A retired teacher wrote on the union’s social-media channel that the government had promised during the war it would send oil prices to $200 a barrel and punish Iran’s attackers. Instead, he said, the country is being battered by its own collapsing currency.

“Three days have passed since we received our August salaries,” he wrote. “There’s barely anything left.”