Russian Population Drop > 1 million Working Age Russians in the Last Year

Tidewater · May 30, 2019

Holy disappearing workforce, Batman!
The number of working-age Russians fell by 1,049,000 between April 2018 and April 2019, the largest drop so far this century.
Employment and unemployment in the Russian Federation in April 2019
Maybe they should spend less time on Facebook creating ads for American political candidates and more time making baby Russians...
(It might be more fun that Facebook, too).

Crimson1967 · May 30, 2019

The link was in Russian. Can you give us some context on exactly what happened?

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jthomas666 · May 30, 2019

Crimson1967 said:
The link was in Russian. Can you give us some context on exactly what happened?

In Russia, population drops you.

Go Bama · May 30, 2019

Not the same article but I found this looking for a translation of Tidewater’s article:

Population Decline In Russia

https://www.thoughtco.com/population-decline-in-russia-1435266

Russia's population peaked in the early 1990s (at the time of the end of the Soviet Union) with about 148 million people in the country. Today, Russia's population is approximately 143 million. The United States Census Bureau estimates that Russia's population will decline from the current 143 million to a mere 111 million by 2050, a loss of more than 30 million people and a decrease of more than 20%.

Tidewater · May 31, 2019

Crimson1967 said:
The link was in Russian. Can you give us some context on exactly what happened?

Sorry. Chrome does a decent job translating.

Anyway, demographics are like the water level in your bathtub. The rate at which water flows in minus the rate at which water flows out will tell you whether the tub water level is rising or lowering (i.e. the population is shrinking or growing)
The Soviets made life suck so bad Soviet couples just did not want to have kids, despite Soviet encouragement to have kids. The current regime has also made life difficult (curtailed freedoms like freedom of speech/freedom of information, government spying on citizens, murdering opposition figures, official encouragement of corruption by public officials).
Lots of young Russians are emigrating to the West,* where there are certain freedoms. Russians still do not live very long (hard environment, massive alcohol abuse).
Few Russian babies + net emigration + short lifespans = shrinking population.

*The Russian Ministry of Education offered to pay for 150,000 young Russians to go study in the West in return for a commitment to work in Russia for 10 years. They could not give away half those scholarships, because so few young Russians wanted to commit to living in Russia after studying in the West.

Go Bama · May 31, 2019

From Wikipedia:

Alcohol consumptionEdit
Main article: Alcoholism in Russia
Alcohol consumption and alcoholism are major problems in Russia. It is estimated that Russians drink 15 litres (26 pints) of pure alcohol each year. This number is nearly 3 times as much as it was in 1990.[SUP][13][/SUP] In Moscow on September 24 of 2009, Russia's interior minister Rashid Nurgaliyev cited the average intake at an estimated 18 liters a year; "In Russia, each person, including babies, accounts for about 18 liters of spirits per year. In the opinion of WHO experts, consumption of more than 8 liters per year poses a real threat to the health of the nation. Russia has long exceeded this level".[SUP][14][/SUP] It has even been reported that excessive alcohol consumption is to blame for nearly half of all premature deaths in Russia.[SUP][15][/SUP]
A recent study blamed alcohol for more than half the deaths (52%) among Russians aged 15 to 54 from 1990 to 2001.[SUP][16][/SUP] For the same demographic, this compares to 4% of deaths for the rest of the world.

Go Bama · May 31, 2019

Something else I found interesting.

Russian Church Leader Calls To End Abortion To Boost Population

https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2019...s-to-end-abortions-to-boost-population-a65647

The article I posted previously said the abortion rate in Russia was higher than the birth rate. This sounds like the exact opposite of Alabama.

Evidently, life in Russia sucks. The socialist experiment was a catastrophic failure. I believe my phobic fears of oppressive government are well founded. I suspect China is in for more of the same on a much larger scale in 25-50 years.

Tidewater · May 31, 2019

Go Bama said:
Something else I found interesting.

Russian Church Leader Calls To End Abortion To Boost Population

https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2019...s-to-end-abortions-to-boost-population-a65647

The article I posted previously said the abortion rate in Russia was higher than the birth rate. This sounds like the exact opposite of Alabama.

Evidently, life in Russia sucks. The socialist experiment was a catastrophic failure. I believe my phobic fears of oppressive government are well founded. I suspect China is in for more of the same on a much larger scale in 25-50 years.

The problem with demographics is that it compounds. When a generation does not have kids, then those missing kids, in turn, are not there a generation later, to have their kids. Women 20-29 are the most significant population in demographics because in industrialized societies, most kids are born to them.
Immediately after the collapse of the Soviet Union, birthrates dropped. There was economic and social chaos, crime rates exploded, so Russian families deferred having kids. Here were are 20-29 years later and all those girls not born in the 90s are not there to have their kids. This is a demographic echo of the 1990s.

Russia is in deep kimchi demographically.

Jon · May 31, 2019

Go Bama said:
Something else I found interesting.

Russian Church Leader Calls To End Abortion To Boost Population

https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2019...s-to-end-abortions-to-boost-population-a65647

The article I posted previously said the abortion rate in Russia was higher than the birth rate. This sounds like the exact opposite of Alabama.

Evidently, life in Russia sucks. The socialist experiment was a catastrophic failure. I believe my phobic fears of oppressive government are well founded. I suspect China is in for more of the same on a much larger scale in 25-50 years.

Russia went from full Communism to crony Capitalist Oligarchical Kleptocracy, hardly a failure of Socialism

crimsonaudio · May 31, 2019

Go Bama said:
From Wikipedia:

Holy crap!

Tidewater · May 31, 2019

crimsonaudio said:
Holy crap!

I met a couple of Russia paratroopers once. They asked me if I liked vodka. I said, "sure."
Big mistake.

The Russians have a special relationship with alcohol.

Crimson1967 · May 31, 2019

Japan is a democracy and they are also having population issues.

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Tidewater · May 31, 2019

Crimson1967 said:
Japan is a democracy and they are also having population issues.

As an historian friend of mine said, "If correlation equalled causation, we'd have more respect for sociology than we do."
Japan is shrinking. That trend may accelerate in the future.
The Russian population is collapsing. A million fewer working age people within one year is a precipitous drop. And what young population there is is shifting from the countryside to the big cities of Moscow and St. Petersburg.

On the other hand, you can probably buy land in Russia cheap in the near future. Of course, then you'd own land in Russia.

TIDE-HSV · May 31, 2019

Jon said:
Russia went from full Communism to crony Capitalist Oligarchical Kleptocracy, hardly a failure of Socialism

I'd argue that all that changed was the label...

Jon · May 31, 2019

TIDE-HSV said:
I'd argue that all that changed was the label...

I wouldn't fight you on that either

Tidewater · Jun 1, 2019

TIDE-HSV said:
I'd argue that all that changed was the label...

By the Brezhnev era, the USSR was a Socialist* Oligarchic Kleptocracy
(* Socialist in the sense of public ownership of the means of production)
Oligarchic within the upper reaches of the party, and kleptocratic, but within bounds. If the kleptocracy became too obvious, the KGB would swoop in.

Putin is most definitely not a bolshevik or socialist. Ideologically, he is a White, like Ilyn. His favorite political philosopher is Ivan Ilyn (1883 – 1954).

Putin had made Ilyn's writings mandatory reading in the Kremlin.

In Putin's Russia, I would not describe the system as capitalist, maybe economically it is closest to Nazy Germany, in which the means of production are officially in private hands, but behind those hands is a secret police with the power to arrest and imprison property owners and confiscate their wealth (e.g. Khodorkovsky). The system is very much oligarchic, centered on the person of Vladimir Vladimirovish Putin and his comrades from the siloviki ("the force men," KGB/FSB/army/GRU). Kleptocracy is clearly the mean MO. It is not tolerated, it is expected, the reason why you seek public office, so you can scrape a little off on the side and pocket it. And everyone wishing to make some money in Russia must find a krisha (a "roof" in Russian, or a protector) and pay him off. The theft goes up the chain, with Putin at the top. He gets a cut.
So, capitalist? Sort of. Oligarchic, definitely. Kleptocratic, for sure.

Tidewater · Jun 2, 2019

Tidewater said:
Holy disappearing workforce, Batman!
The number of working-age Russians fell by 1,049,000 between April 2018 and April 2019, the largest drop so far this century.
Employment and unemployment in the Russian Federation in April 2019

And the other shoe drops. Why is a plummeting working age population such a problem for the Russians?
Russia is trying to field a military of 1 million men (& presumably a few women).
There are two sources for these men: conscripts and voluntary/contract soldiers.
Military service is extremely unpopular (it's dangerous and conscripts are treated callously with demeaning hazing rituals), so parents in Russia seek medical disability for their sons. This is something of a cottage industry in Russia. It is expensive to get a doctor to sign a statement and then bribe the conscription official to accept the doctor's disability determination.
Why do authorities tighten rules for conscription? (in Russian)

"About 30% of each "conscript class" receive health deferments. ... Until 2030, the number of young men who will reach the age of 18 every year will not exceed 650 thousand. ... Putin’s demand to bring the Armed Forces to the millions of people cannot be fulfilled in principle.

Russia cannot retain the contract soldiers they hire, so they are now doing what the Soviets did: they are building hollow units, units with the officers & NCOs needed for a full-strength unit, but without the junior enlisted men. These will be drafted/recalled in the event of a war. How such units would perform in a war is difficult to determine. The Soviets gave up 2.5 million prisoners of war to the Wehrmacht in 1941 alone.

Crimson1967 · Jun 2, 2019

What is the going rate for a bone spurs diagnosis in Russia?

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Its On A Slab · Jun 3, 2019

TIDE-HSV said:
I'd argue that all that changed was the label...

Exactly. The country is run by a former big honcho in the KGB during Soviet times.

I know a ton of expat Russians here and in the Chicago area. Many working it high-tech, business, medical careers. To a person, they agree that they will probably never go back there to live. Choosing the craziness of current US over the mess that is Russia today.

I've shared this before, but one of my neighbors when I lived in Omaha was a former officer in an armored division of the Soviet Army. His stories of freezing to death on manuevers, working for years to finally get a one bedroom, concrete flat. Going without dinner so their son could have something to eat. When i knew him, he had a 3 bedroom house, a nice fenced-in yard in the 'burbs. He never complained about his move to the US.

TIDE-HSV · Jun 3, 2019

Its On A Slab said:
Exactly. The country is run by a former big honcho in the KGB during Soviet times.

I know a ton of expat Russians here and in the Chicago area. Many working it high-tech, business, medical careers. To a person, they agree that they will probably never go back there to live. Choosing the craziness of current US over the mess that is Russia today.

I've shared this before, but one of my neighbors when I lived in Omaha was a former officer in an armored division of the Soviet Army. His stories of freezing to death on manuevers, working for years to finally get a one bedroom, concrete flat. Going without dinner so their son could have something to eat. When i knew him, he had a 3 bedroom house, a nice fenced-in yard in the 'burbs. He never complained about his move to the US.

And he went back to be the director of the successor agency to the KGB, which he had joined in his early 20s. He rose as high as the director for Dresden in East Germany, before resigning to go into politics as the mayor (in effect) of Leningrad. Your comment about the Russian emigres reminded me of an incident - Several years ago, I was filling up at Costco in my Miata. A peculiarity is that you have to click several times or you'll end up with a tank about 1.5 gallons short of full. I explained that to the attendant and we struck up a conversation. He related that, recently, he observed a customer with his finger down the filler tube, depressing the trip mechanism. He walked over and told the guy he couldn't do that. The guy replied, in a thick Russian accent, "Vy not? Dat way it hold more." The attendant explained that, not only was it a violation of Costco's rules, it was a violation of federal law. The guy replied that he'd left Russia so he wouldn't have to talk to the KGB, and "talking to you is just like talking to the KGB." The secret police haven't been called the KGB for a very long time, which tells you this guy had been in the States a long time. (I may have posted this story before.)

Russian Population Drop > 1 million Working Age Russians in the Last Year

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