State of Russian Economy 1 Year Into the War

How has the Russian economy fared after one year of conflict with Ukraine? The answer might surprise you! Check out today's insane new video to find out how Russia is still afloat after a somewhat disastrous year of conflict.

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[viktorhoritonov]

I'm from Russia. In general, we did not begin to live much worse. But prices for appliances, cars, cosmetics and household chemicals have grown significantly. I see no future for Russia as long as the Putin regime exists. I hope I will be able to emigrate from Russia in the near future.

[Estarfigam]

I do find it ironic that one insult the Russians had towards us was calling us Imperialist.

[wabalaladabdab]

It's very annoying that people misinterpret the reason for the sanctions. It's not about a quick collapse for them and fast victory for us, but it's about denying them the opportunity and the ability to start the NEXT war. This war is directly decided by the weapon supply and the military production capabilities, but the next and the next wars that Russia would totally start (they already have the list of countries to conquer), are decided by the current economic performance.
If Russia has the physical, economical ability to start the next wars, it will do so. To prevent the next wars for generations, we need to keep tightening the sanctions for decades. Even if Russia loses the current war and leaves Ukraine completely and signs a peace treaty, the sanctions cannot be lifted for decades or until there's complete political and social change in Russia. And this doesn't just mean that putin is gone and there are elections again, because a vengeful Russian population would just vote for another madman. The sanctions cannot be lifted (actually it must be strengthened) until the Russian populations mindset convincingly changes, and Russia turns into a European liberal democracy. If this will never happen then the sanctions shall never be lifted.

[southernsmoke]

The US fought a losing war for 20 years yet its economy continued to grow so thinking Russia’s would decrease was a bit shortsighted.

[sparkystevo]

I saw a great piece interviewing a Yale professor and he summed it up beautifully. He said “where does the world bank and everyone get their figures from?” The Russian bureau of statistics! 🤣 and guess what they LIE! The real state of the Russian economy is that it’s in free fall. He also said many of the world banks economists are Russian too 🤣

[NIGHTBREEDR]

This War shows us all just how connected we really are on a global scale.

[jameskelley]

An economy going bad is like how you lose at jenga, slowly then really fast. You can artificially prop it up for awhile but when just the right thing fails it all goes bad and quickly.

[whitethunderwhitethunder]

How ironic that an economy can thrive as the people it's suppose to represent suffer in starvation, homelessness, and poverty...

[rylian]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't the IMF report rely on Russia's self-reported numbers? I mean, of course Russia wouldn't LIE about such a thing, would they?

I've seen independent reports which vary between a 15 to 25% contraction because actual numbers are hard to come by, so they make do with the ones they get and try to plot a general trend.

[BoingHase]

That IMF estimate has been debunked by a Yale economist, which the US government now also recognizes as meaningless. Even Russian financiers and economists predict a 3-4% decrease in growth this year. You may want to review the critiques and update.

[GRosa]

More restrictions have gone in place since last December. Russia can no longer sell/export crude oil via ship and they can no longer sell refined oil products. They just cut oil production by 5% and will most likely need to make further cuts to production. Things are going to get much worse for them in the near future. Hopefully their entire economy implodes.

[ED-esqv]

The rosy forecasts were assuming that the January and February purchase drops would be picked up by India and China, but it hasn’t. January and February have been a fraction of last year’s income.

[prw]

There are ethnic russians, and there are non-ethnic russians, and I've heard their experience of the last year has been pretty vastly different for each other, and thus their opinions on the war are pretty different.

Ethnic russians, particularly those in cities like st petersburg that were mostly protected from mobilization, supposedly have the opinion that the russia shouldn't stop (around 70% in favor, especially older russians who ought to know better).

Yea they are also just trying to get by, but its a bit harder to be sympathetic when considering that.

Edit: Someone brought to my attention that the poll was probably bs (its russia, we don't think their polls are honest about other things, so it makes sense). So it might not be majority in favor, though ethnic russians being shielded from mobilization probably does have an influence on opinions.

Soviet nostalgia in those same areas has been on the rise even before the war (and its very easy to believe since these areas had it much better than the satellite states and other areas of russia during the soviet union), but the jury is still out on the majority opinion of anything in russia.

[brandondavis]

Russia before the war: Butter was around $7 for one stick.
Russia after the war: Butter is around $27 for one stick, and it's locked in a theft proof case. Oh, and there's only like 5 sticks in total for sale that day.

[robertbarrows]

Their oil profits are now falling a lot too. With the 60 dollar price cap, they have to sell oil to China and India at a loss since they have to give them huge discounts to make it worth while.

[OGbobbyKUSH]

Remember when “winter is coming” for Europe and it was supposed to freeze to death? Or was that just supposed to be Ukraine?

[az]

please also note that companies who claimed to have exited Russia to support Ukraine have also returned via 3rd party sellers. Those companies sell their goods to a 3rd party vendor who ships it to Russia and sell the goods under their name just marked up higher from cost of shipping the item. Effectively they are sitting on both sides of the boat without shame.

[erickvermeulen]

Putin and Wagner have reduced the expenses of the Russian penal system, and dead Russian soldiers do not get salaries or bonuses. That will help on the balance sheet.

[penguinking]

GDP is measured in transactions. The price of oil skyrocketed after the war started. Discounting very high priced oil can still be a GDP increase. Sanctions also have the effect of slowing the flow of capital to outside the country. An economy will adapt to sanctions to provide their own goods instead of importing them. Same with exports. Just because exports decline, internal demand increases to offset import losses.

[soundfx]

Anybody interested in this might also be interested in 'Perun' "Why War Economies don't collapse (until they do) - why Russia and Ukraine won't collapse tomorrow"