How’s Russia’s Economy Actually Doing?

Data suggests that the Russian economy has held up pretty well considering its military spending and Western sanctions. But can we trust their numbers? If we can, what is driving their apparent economic over-performance? And can they keep sustaining it?

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[AeSyrNation]

The "record low 2.3% unemployment" sounds good until you notice that there's just no one to work. Russia is experiencing an unprecedented workforce deficit due to both low birthrates and dead conscripts

[someidiotwithnoname]

Don't forget that the Soviet Union was reporting GDP growth trough the 80's and then just went bankrupt.

[adam-k]

GDP is not an accurate measure of a wartime economy. If the half the production of Russia's economy is weapons and then they are burned in Ukraine. It will show up as a massive economic output. However the benefit of that output will never be realized.
It is like saying a car manufacturer is very successful because it produces a million cars a month. But then every single car is driven into a chasm before it gets sold.

[ChristianJacquet-myrl]

I recently saw Tucker Carlson's interview with Putin, and it was fascinating to observe how media narratives can be shaped and distorted to serve specific agendas.

[HypaxBE]

With Russia's track record of telling lies, I don't understand why any credibility is given to the numbers they are providing right now, they have 0 motivation to be honest about it.
Glad to see this topic return to TLDR, hoping for more :)

[MultiMinecraftism]

18% interest rates, 2.3% unemployment. Ya this economy is burning up

[mrreziik]

Well using the propaganda numbers it looks good, but we really trust that a country with almost 20% interest rate has low inflation??

[jeroendebruyne]

The IMF and World Bank use the numbers, presented by Rostat. No surprise their analysis will correspond closely with what Russia wants to paint as the picture.
Rhis is circular way of thinking.
Maybe that was a part that should not have been TLDR'd.

Generally I like this channel.
But this was a big miss.

[steveosborne]

You state that the IMF predict growth for Russia next year but of course they are using the figures given to them by the Russians .
You might also ask if the Russian economy is doing so well and inflation is at the rate they claim why are the interest rates now approaching 20%

[SC_]

I wish TLDR would post more content on the Ukraine war.
It’s been overshadowed by the war in Gaza.

[bababababababa]

As a Nigerian I am in no position to mock another country’s economy so I won’t be taking part in this discussion

[Jordan_Warrington]

The amount of people that think GDP is a sign of a good ecconomy is too frequant. GDP is one figure in a much larger picture.
@JoeBlogs does a great job at showing this.

[anatolikbelikov]

The best way to describe the Russian economy right now is if a person with diabetes got his hands on tons of sweet candy and has a huge sugar crash and is hyped up to the max, like on steroids, so he feels fantastic at the moment. The problem lies in the long term - what happens when he runs out of sugar, dopamine goes down and health problems catch up with him. (The analogy taken from a podcast with a Russian economist)

[Dread_]

How bad in russian economy? Larger and larger spending on army and 3rd largest interest rates in the world tell us everything we need to know. They're going back to USSR in 1980s.

[Blackfatrat]

Please vary your outros more. I feel like I'm getting insane by hearing the same thing every single time so often.

[samuela-aegisdottir]

Military spending is te worst way how to boost your GDP. War is like throwing money out of window and counting it as a revenue.

[bobjoe]

Vladimir Milov, an economist said the Russian economy is suffering massively and that the sanctions are working relatively well. He said that the speculation that the economy is just fine is just journalistic fiction.

[lentinant]

The big issue with their economy now is that it is a giant bubble. They cannot do anything with the inflation - that much their own government has confessed officially (check recent financial assembly, when they have increased interest rates to 18%).

Moreover, there are numerous other small but important details. For example, increased company tax combined with insane interest rate can bankrupt a lot of businesses, which will furthermore negatively affect the possibility to fullfil demand. Or the fact that prices growth could be much more significant if not for literal price management from the government (businesses sell goods with much lower margin line just because government would fine them otherwise).

The bigger this bubble will grow - the more painful it will be when it bursts. Nabiullina already mentioned herself that this can be only fixed by recession.

[bikkiikun]

Imagine how much better off the Russian people could have been without this war, had Russia invested all this cash into its industy and infrastructure.
But alas, battlefield stories are far more intersting than a ribbon cutting on a new strech of road or a bridge somewhere in the countryside.

[SimplyVanis]

Russian economy is booming in the same way as if we all started to break the glass of our house windows. Economy would start to boom, glass businesses would even becoming the most profitable business in the country...

It would boosts the economy, but how many windows can we smash before we all go broke and we all are left with buildings with smashed windows?