Member-only story
A look beyond Moscow for Russia’s despair.
Tales from the Narod
Realities of Rural Russia
In my last article ( found here ) I discussed how sanctions were having impacts in some areas on some Russians, but for many Russians the sanctions were having no impact at all.
For someone who travelled once a year to Italy or France, had a taste for European cheese, bought things from Amazon and a host of subscription services such as Netflix and Microsoft products- the effect of sanctions is certainly noticeable-but still largely manageable. For instance, about 50% of brands that closed have quietly re-opened, often under different legal structures. Other methods such as parallel imports, where products are first shipped to third countries who then sell to Russia- cover most of the rest. Of course this adds to the cost of things and inflation is double what we in the West are complaining about.
But the other part of the “no effect of sanctions” is the general state of things outside Moscow. Moscow is a sprawling city with one of the highest populations in the world. People just don’t know how many people live in it but most guess between 15–20 million. Still, Russia has over 140 million people and only a dozen cities with populations over 1 million. The rest are scattered around, mostly in the European side of Russia west of the…
