ONCE AGAIN, PUTIN LIES TO HIS RUSSIAN CITIZENS

…This president is acting like a third-world dictator and needs to be stopped.

 

A Russian economy expert tells the truth about the Russian economy at his own risk.

 

Last week in a meeting outside Moscow, Vladi­mir Putin stated that: “The worst of Russia's economic crisis is over.”  Really?

 

Well, if you are someone that follows international news, you may also follow writers that you trust more than others for giving you the straight scoop on certain subjects. 

 

That’s the way I feel about a Mr. Vladislav Inozemtsev.  Mr. Inozemtsev is a Russian that is the Director of the Center for Post-Industrial Studies in Moscow, and is currently a visiting fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington.

 

Vladislav is an expert on the subject of Russia’s economy and he definitely does not agree with his nationional leader’s optimistic statement.

 

The Director does agree that from 2000 to 2007, the Russian economy grew by about 7% a year, and the Russian stock market increased while the average worker’s incomes more than tripled. Taxes were lowered and international cooperation increased. The Russian economy was on the increase and its people were doing very well.

 

When back in 2008, the US had its worst financial crisis since the Great Depression, that crisis was also an international crisis.  Many countries, including Russia, were severely affected.  Even though the US economy in many areas has rebounded to approximately where it was in 2008, the Russian economy has continued to worsen.

 

During the past 12 months, Russia’s gross domestic product declined 3.9%, which was less than had been anticipated.  The government did manage to keep inflation below 13%, but early official forecasts promising a return to growth by the third quarter of 2015 went unrealized.  Subsequent projections of growth resuming later this year also look very unrealistic today.

 

Between 2008 and 2015, the average annual growth has been virtually zero.  Foreign investors in Russia are non-existent and the business climate has deteriorated.  Dozens of new taxes have been introduced or other taxes increased. Military expenditures doubled as President Putin launched his military operations in Georgia, Ukraine and Syria, and Putin appears to have completely shifted his interest from internal economic matters to geo-politics.

 

The Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev has admitted that Russia had not truly exited the previous crisis before it found itself in the midst of a new one.  With the Russian economy now totally involved in politics, and the latter becoming more reactionary, there is little hope for a recovery.  That is even if the sanctions from the West are lifted and if oil prices somehow return to more normal levels.

 

With Russia’s “counter-sanctions” against the European Union, the tensions with Turkey have increased.  The Russian proclamations that international treaties are being overridden by the ever-changing Russian laws, this has discouraged domestic and international investors from expanding in Russia. In the past year, more than 20 Western corporations, including Opel, Adobe Systems and Stockmann, have terminated their Russian businesses.  Something like 30 manufacturing facilities owned by foreign companies have closed. Net emigration away from Russia rose from 35,000 citizens a year in the years up to 2010, to more than 400,000 citizens by preliminary estimates in 2015.  Mr. Inozemtsev see no signs that all these trends might change.

 

If the Russian economy contracts in 2016 as it did in 2015, it may well be the beginning of a prolonged downturn.  It may be something akin to what took place in Venezuela from the late 2000s. If so, the current standstill phase will move into a free fall that could last for years.  This would run well into Putin’s fourth term beginning in 2018.

 

Whatever we have gone through in the US is nothing compared to what has been going on in Russia.  With Putin’s focus on his wars in Ukraine and Syria, the nation’s resources are going down the drain and there is no success for the Russian citizens on the horizon.

 

Mr. Inozemtsev advises that all those tracking Russia’s economic performance need to tread carefully. If growth does not resume this year, it could signal that the country has entered a time of economic self-destruction that would mark the third phase of Putin’s reign.  And since the government threatens or rids the nation of anyone that spreads negative news about the government, the Russian public will never know the truth about what’s going on in their own nation.

 

It’s also why Mr. Inozemtsev may want to stay on as a visiting fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington.  This information that he has published here in the US would not have been allowed to be published in Russia. 

 

Personally, I would suggest that as other journalists that have written articles against Russia or Putin have miraculously disappeared, never to be seen again, I would suggest that this visiting fellow should apply for a permanent Visa in the United States.

 

Copyright G.Ater  2016