A pint costs £3.30 in Edinburgh
Well, I’d imagine you did, if you live in Edinburgh. Me, I was shocked. “That’s George Street prices,” said the girl behind the bar, as though George Street was some sort of gold-plated spaceport street, into which beer had to be flown on gold-plated rockets. Even a decade ago there were no bars on George Street. In my residual childhood memories, it remains the New Town’s dull street. The one behind John Menzies.
My first assumption was that this was a Festival thing, this £3.30 business. Edinburgh locals (something I am slowly realising I no longer am) nurse an only very slightly secret disdain for fancy London festival types (something I am slowly realising I have become), but it is coupled with a brazen urge to profiteer. £1,000 for a week’s rent. £3.30 for a pint. That sort of thing.
But no. According to a survey just completed by an insurance company, Edinburgh is the second most expensive city, relative to wages, in the UK. Cardiff is No 1. London is way down there at No 9. When these stilt-walkers, fire-jugglers and distressing outbreaks of mime have all departed, in other words, many of the prices will remain. We festival types, actually, are not that fancy at all.