Russia's invasion of Ukraine: Part 5
in War in Ukraine ·
Timothy Williams5 said:Russians are dodging draft notices and skipping work, causing a massive GDP slump
Vladislav Inozemtsev discusses how mobilization hits the economy and the implications for the KremlinIt’s becoming painfully obvious that the government wants to treat the population like cattle, but they’re hitting significant roadblocks—mainly because people actually expect resistance. This creates a perfect storm for disproportionately heavy mobilization in remote areas, rural towns, and small villages. We’ve already seen instances from the Far East, down in Buryatia or Yakutia, where nearly half the male population of certain villages is being hauled off to assembly points. This means local economies that were already stagnant are now staring down total collapse; thousands of families will be left without any income, and local small businesses and entrepreneurs are simply going to go extinct.
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You could argue that Russia has recently functioned as an economy driven by major cities and massive corporations (with Moscow alone accounting for over 20% of the GDP), but there is another factor at play here. Unlike the more compliant rural populations, the "modern" urbanites in the big cities have zero interest in fertilizing Ukrainian soil with their bodies—and tens of thousands of them have already fled within their own borders (and I'm not just talking about those rushing toward the border crossings; we’ll likely see a state of emergency and closed borders very soon). People are avoiding living where they are officially registered, the number of men in regional city centers during the work week has dropped significantly, and movement between regions has plummeted.
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Naturally, one would assume that military recruitment offices will soon start hunting people down at their jobs rather than at their registered addresses, which will deal the most devastating blow to the economy: millions of people would rather quit their jobs entirely than head off to war. On the flip side, economic efficiency in large cities is much higher than in rural areas, meaning that losing even a handful of employees can cause disproportionate damage to a firm. The temporary "disappearance" of at least 3 to 4 million people from the formal labor market won't go unnoticed. Consequently, I would venture to say that by November, the national GDP will shrink by at least 4-6% compared to August, and the following months will only serve to solidify that downward trend.
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https://theins.ru/opinions/inozemtsev/255405
The resistance to mobilization is starting to look like a highly combustible mixture—I call it the Ukrainian Smoothie😉 if that whole thing catches fire, just like our General Spider said the sky and the earth will burn, so let it all go up in flames within the borders of Russia🍿
