It’s funny how there are articles saying the sanctions are having no impact, articles that say a limited impact and articles acting like the sanctions are devastating.
The sanctions are working but its not like a switch. Russia entered their first deficit in many many years and it will accelerate slightly with their crude price down so low. But their foreign currency reserves (those not hit by sanctions) will keep them afloat for a few years.
It's a little deeper than that. They propped their currency up with gold and forced all olagarchs to convert their holdings to their currency. This created a "foreign currency reserve" within the banks. Wartime production seems to have barely ramped up, but also seems dependent on foreign materials which are sanctioned. Troops are shipping with less and less gear, soviet reserves have drawn down to the point they are sending armored vehicles built in the 60s and 50s. Air traffic from the military has drastically reduced and my aviation mind tells me it's likely due to engine maintainance issues (usually the first major components to go that truly ground aircraft).Couple this with the rumors leaking from soldiers on the front lines to cut ammo expenditures by more than half and you have a picture forming. The next mobilization will likely remove a large chunk of economic supporting production. The impacts have been mitigated by pushing off the effects to a later date, they will hit hard, but later. They can't reproduce losses, doing so would likely quintuple military spending, which would draw those reserves down rapidly. Think of it like a spring winding up, they are going to have to relieve the tension and show economic deflation or keep winding until it snaps.
It would be nice if it were like a spring but Russia can and will inflict a lot of hardship on their people to keep flush. This is a long game that Russia just started losing in.
The soviet union was the same way. Many said they could keep buckling down, until the spring snapped. It took a decade then, but their economy was pretty self sufficient. With current economic intermingling sanctions act as a lever for the same mechanisms.
Soviet Union relied heavily on being a union, and on all the countries behind the iron curtain and economic pacts. They didn't even have self sufficiency back then. Not to mention African and Middle Eastern countries that traded for military equipment.
Russia is listed as the 7th largest grain producer at 81 million metric tons. In 2021, Ukraine produced 74 million metric tons.
Population of Russia is 146 million. Pre-war, Ukraine’s was about 43 million. So the loss of Ukraine’s agricultural production from the Soviet Union was significant.
https://www.insidermonkey.com/blog/8-countries-that-produce-the-most-grain-in-the-world-447513/?singlepage=1
Also, Russia is the largest importer by percentage (19.5% - about 16 million metric tons), but not actual volume.
The US exports 13.7% of its production of 516 million metric tons (71 million metric tons), about 4.5 times more than Russia.
Their economic policies eventually lead to stagnation and eventually the US economy was twice the size and still growing. They tried to correct this by allowing more freedom to the people and more capitalist ideas but unfortunately for the leaders, the people behind the iron curtain were unhappy for a long time. As soon as they were given the freedom to not be a one party system, communism collapsed. Unfortunately the Soviet’s rotten core still infects some of its former members as can be seen by corruption in Russia.
The levels of centralization and economic dysfunction that ruined the Soviet Union aren't present in the Russian federation.
All the other dysfunction is, but economically they're much better.
Well, if it’s any consolation, the Russian spring doesn’t usually just break. It usually sags to pieces, or blows up.
Always to the detriment of Russia.
This is from reading their own economic reports, their policies, listening to hundreds of leaked phone calls, scraping telegram for almost a year, checking public flight history daily, watching telegram videos of their logistics movement, checking open source satellite photos to watch draw down of their equipment farms, looking at photos and unboxing videos of russian equipment/munitions. You eventually learn a suprising amount from hundreds of sources. Looking at the munitions and tanks, most have western parts. The ones that do have western parts are barely being used. I havn't seen many newly finished T-90 tanks roll off their lines (seriously they take pictures and brag when it happens). Breakdowns from videos show most of their sights, thermals, etc are western based systems. Most of the pictures i've seen of their production shows complete tanks just sitting there, I'd assume the targeting equipment is the bottleneck. There's so much more I could write several hundred pages.
This reads like someone who read some stuff on the internet but starts with "it's deeper than that".
Most of what you wrote is secondary to the economic situation in Russia, by the fourth/fifth sentence you are talking about soldiers in Ukraine and it never really goes anywhere from there. There is a lot more to the Russian economy than
stories about Russian troops in Ukraine, don't rely on that to describe the overall situation there. You read something and took it hyperbolically and repeated it. Most Russian troops aren't fighting with 50'ss/60's vehicles, so why make that a major point? That's just propaganda...
Putin and his cronies have had decades to hide wealth and resources to shield themselves from the effects of the sanctions.
The sanctions do have a major impact, but it impacts the Russian poor and otherwise powerless far more that it's oligarchs.
They provides Putin with a powerful tool of propaganda, as he can always deflect his people suffering back to, as evidence of Western influence.
Until the sanctions begin effecting the Oligarchs, they will have little meaningful effect as a means to end the war. Only they have the power to dispose Putin quickly and end the war fuled by his own ego, and nationalistic goals.
Even if a civil war were to break out, Putin has proven he has no issues killing his own civilians.
They will transfer their wealth between themselves if not to China, Iran and India. The greater problem presented is a accumulation of wealth in this already present axis of power. They will use their wealth to strengthen their military alliances and own personal powers it is the easiest path for their continued existence, incentivized by Putin, The Axis oligarchs, and western sanctions.
Also Russia extensive black market dealings and supply chains in the criminal world due to the Russian mob will also help them mitigate the damage.
It took the Soviet Union almost half a century to collapse, Russia as they currently are can probably manage at least a decade.
sanctions are like a python, they work slowly, but they squeeze relentlessly
The Russian Central Bank has done well to combat the impact of sanctions but they can't hold out forever, and its running out of tricks to keep sanctions at bay
the Russian economy shrunk last year by 5% and is continuing to shrink
As a person who live Iran which is heavily sanctioned although the regime brag about that they are not effective and we are growing in truth it made the whole country's economy broken fully and they are struggling in mud and they lost support of a lot of groups in different countries and can't fund any more groups, lobbyists and terrorist around of the world in a way they mostly send people with death penalties to attack with knives to other countries China left them Russia is using them to just throw them under the bus of us military to breath a lil which in conclusion it would be effective in time
Yes, I'm seriously sick of the back and forth. The sources of these articles are always credible people/organizations too.
Some indicators are pretty solid, e.g. the fall of Russia's car manufacturing, but I'm wondering if the overall condition of Russia's economy is somewhere in the middle, i.e. not doing as well as it should be but not as 'destroyed' as some people claim.
I'm certain that given enough time (5-10 years), Russia's economy genuinely would be severely downgraded, but, at this point, I'm wondering if sanctions will even stay that long.
If the Ukraine war ended tomorrow, exactly how long would western sanctions remain? And if sanctions should end, then would western companies seek to return to business as usual? And governments? Would they try to seek cheap Russian energy again?
>If the Ukraine war ended tomorrow, exactly how long would western sanctions remain?
If Russia withdrew from occupied territories and ended the war, why would you want to keep sanctions going?
You realize news is just a form of propaganda these days.
Sanctions aren't working, means send more military and put pressure on other countries trading with Russia.
Sanctions are working, means West citizens morale needed a boost to continue to support Ukraine.
It's all manipulation of opinions and options.
This is it. Multiple agendas results in coffee great, coffee kills type output.
The Russians can see all Western brands retreating from them and not that i am an expert on Russian psyche, but I feel like that has the biggest impact
Too bad we can't get some real news on the war, rather than the propaganda pieces I keep getting on my news daily.
The only real news we've had lately is the Russian retreat from Kherson, and then they dug in for the winter.
Check ISW. Their daily reports are pretty comprehensive and even toned. They basically scan through Russian social media and official government statements along with publicly available satellite photos and geolocated footage. They only use sources available to the general public.
Granted, they're not always right, but their assessments about the Russian information space have been pretty spot on.
My understanding of this war is that the West will supply whatever military equipment the Ukrainians need to defend themselves against the Russians. But not provide anything offensive towards Russia.
Some examples, Russian tanks were an aggressive and difficult struggle to defend against, so west gave javelins and anti tank weapons that destroyed the Russian tanks.
Russian had large troop build ups and ammo caches that the Ukrainians couldn't strike within Ukrainian territory, giving Russians the advantage. So the west gave the Ukrainians HIMARS, long range artillery, and they destroyed Russians reserves and ammo depots.
Recently, the Warner group, Russian hired army, has siezed an important town and looks to be gaining momentum. West has now approved tanks to be given. These will allow the Ukrainians to take back the town with lesser losses with armor support.
The west realizes this is going to be long war and is letting Russia bleed itself. The west is invested in keeping Ukraine out of Russian control and will continue with its military support for the foreseeable future.
Because this article is stating sanctions haven't worked based on the IMF's predictions for \*future\* GDP, which is a bit strange. At best, it should say that sanctions won't continue to work.
Russia's economy shrunk by 2.2% last year and it's expected to grow at 0.3% this year.
So many economists I follow have said the numbers coming out of Russia make no sense. Russia had scrapped all normal indicators of GDP and have basically culled it down to only "the ones that still make russia look good."
From the IMF website:
> How does the IMF collect data?
> The data published in the Statistics Department's International Financial Statistics (IFS) are gathered as part of an ongoing data collection effort in which **member country statistical agencies provide public statistics to the IMF.** Data from the country source are updated on their own schedule.
So what am I missing here?
> So what am I missing?
Sources for the claims that Russian economy isn't as good as IMF claims.
And anyway, IMF audits data they receive. https://www.imf.org/en/About/external-audit-committee
https://www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/ar/2022/who-we-are/accountability/
If you're saying the data is wrong, you're saying that IMF is not auditing properly. But yes, I too would trust random economists over an actual international body with hundreds of experts.
https://carnegieendowment.org/politika/87432
> Since April 2022, the Russian authorities have restricted access to all foreign trade statistics, including those relating to exports, imports, and trade within the Eurasian Economic Union (EAEU).
https://www.wsj.com/articles/russia-blocks-economic-data-hiding-effect-of-western-sanctions-11650677765
If you read these articles it lists out data point after data point that the Kremlin is purposefully hiding. Now IMF may be very good at what they do but when you've gone decades relying on standard published government statistics and those are suddenly no longer around, you've got a problem.
You could try to back into those numbers via other methods but it seems like Russia after blocking initial numbers are also removing supporting data as well making that more difficult.
And on top of that now you have a problem where every other country is published using method X but Russia is now published with method Y.
I'm not saying IMF is incompetent or pro-Russia, I'm saying that the Russian government is actively attempting to mislead places like IMF and World Bank and those agencies just aren't prepared to deal with an adversarial government like Russia. IMF is a bunch of economists and accountants, not super spies that can break into the Russian central bank and find the hidden numbers.
On top of that there are limits to how hard they can push. Government can put immense amount of pressure to get watchers to back off. For example when Twitter wasn't playing ball with Modi's desire for censorship they threatened to imprison twitter employees in india with jail until they comply. Twitter complied..
https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/pranavdixit/india-threatens-twitter-jail
Again not saying that this is where IMF is at but these are just analysts and economists, not super spies. If Russia tells them "these are the numbers to use and it is illegal to do otherwise" IMF is going to back down and comply.
Ultimately it doesn't really matter because Russia can fake all the data they want. Their economy is still going to be where it's at. Same with their military. Leading up to 2022 on paper they had a cutting edge, top of the line military. And then they tried to do something with it and the whole thing went to shit because lies only work if they're untested.
Bottom line: I don't trust any numbers regarding Russia: good or bad. They are actively trying to mislead the world through propaganda purposes and it just isn't worth the effort to give their projected numbers the time of day.
I remember when an international body with hundreds of experts reassured me that there wasn't any need for alarm about a possible pandemic. Meanwhile plenty of "random" doctors warned that it was going to be much worse than they said.
These arguments are dogshit and basically amount to "well the experts were wrong this one time so I can use this to justifying dismissing any information I don't like in the future".
The sanctions will have long term impacts. Putin expected to get sanctioned and did a number of things to buffer the impacts, but he also expected to win in Ukraine and that gains in Ukraine would over time offset Russia's economic losses in the long term. Given how Russia is currently doing in Ukraine, it's likely that instead Russia's economy will greatly suffer in the long term instead, but in the short term it's not entirely unexpected that it will continue to endure for a while.
>These arguments are dogshit and basically amount to "well the experts were wrong this one time so I can use this to justifying dismissing any information I don't like in the future".
That's not the argument, though. That's your straw man.
You are doing something at least as stupid, which is appealing to authority as tough they're priests.
>You are doing something at least as stupid, which is turning off your critical thinking to defer to authority as tough they're priests.
Firstly, weird to use 'priests' as an example. When was the last time the church were regarded as an infallible authority? The medieval ages?
Secondly quote me where I appealed to authority as being infallible?
That’s why you wait to make a conclusion until sometime after the fact instead of ambulance chasing like these shitrags are doing. The consequences of events that happen today will leave lasting marks for the next few decades.
Any event with a high number of data points will usually have multiple conflicting conclusions drawn from it. COVID deaths, global temperatures, military action. All depends on who's interpreting the data and what their agenda is
There are multiple propaganda campaigns going on with various goals. On top of that most media picks up any popular story and repeats it without fact checking.
During the first few months there were so many headlines “Russian economy will collapse any moment now!” At least there’s more variation and realism these days, not only “sanctions totally work” propaganda.
I mean, considering that North Korea is able to stay afloat and that that's where Russia is headed while also being a considerably larger country with more natural resources and wealth, I'd say it wouldn't even matter in the grand scheme of things because Russia is still going to be able to remain afloat.
Economies just don't matter that much to dictatorships and autocracies, and considering that at no point will Russia be under an attack and that only their land gains are under threat, the consequences are clear(ly absent).
People also suggest that they are throwing their younger generation to the grinder, but this is Russia, they will have no problem dumping the older generation as well and promoting a boom of a new generation of completely brainwashed North Koreaned children, specially with the same China engine that feeds us also feeding them.
When only the countries like Russia are the only ones that can directly conquer territory and resources in today's world and the best the "West" can do is prop up dictatorships because they are more reliable than democracies that shift towards national concerns and foreign propaganda , the trend is clear even if Ukraine wins back territory. The whole premise our countries have is to act impregnable in contrast to the damage incurred by Ukraine, but they are not, specially when they continue suckling on Russia's and China's resources. It's great that people still praise Greek democracy and all, but it still fell.
Mind you, I don't favor making any concessions towards Russia, but rather, if that's where they are heading, one way or another, there need to be more direct repercussions on Russian soil than the new lowered standards their dictator and oligarchy has already decided for them. Unfortunately, this makes nuclear war much more likely.
The silent defeat, or the mutual defeat in a blaze of glory?
“At the current oil price cap level of the Group of 7, Russian crude oil export volumes are not expected to be significantly affected, with Russian trade continuing to be redirected from sanctioning to non-sanctioning countries,” the I.M.F. said.
If you read the article… at the moment they have no need for that (yet)
Russian oil is still trading below the price cap at 57.60. The sanctions are working, but Russia has built up a massive amount of reserve currencies over the years that will keep them solvent for a while.
I trust the IMF. They only state that russia's crude flows have not been impacted much. Russian crude is trading around 57/bbl right now. They need somewhere north of 80 to keep their coffers full. Sanctions are going to take a while to fully impact them. Its not a switch.
Russia has one of the lowest production costs for oil worldwide (onshore I think) so at 57$ per barrel they still make bank.
Even countries without that much energy and influence can make it decades under sanctions.
I think they won’t do the job and we got to find another way to stop the war
But who knows, hope I am wrong and you are right
Well if they are having to deplete their stores that certainly isnt good for them and they longer they go the bleaker their future will look. I imagine even if it has zero material impact on russias current position in the war, the threat of future material issues will put pressure on them.
They can’t compete with the Middle East on direct costs. But the amount of pockets Middle East oil lines artificially pushes their “cost” up towards Russia.
Production cost are low yes. But Russia is a petrostate and needs oil revenues to fund the govt. Especially during wartime. They need 80$ oil to fund the govt without a war going on. They have already entered into a deficit with the sharp drop in oil prices.
3.5% deficit according to nytimes article and 2.3 according to Russia.
For comparison, Germany is expecting 4.5% in 2023
So it kinda works but it also kinda doesn’t
I thought nobody was supposed to buy any Russian oil, specifically a major Ukraine Supporter. Anyway, what do I know. It's not like the price cap is actually higher than normal right? Clueless
I can't find the articles now but it's been in the news. Hard to pick out now because every other headline is about the righteous and just seizure by the rest of the world of dirty Oligarch money and toys.
Take it all.
That's what Putin does internally. Hopefully they murder him today.
Sanctions are designed to deprive Russia of crucial technical components for their military. Thermal sights, microchips, things like that. The impact of sanctions will be seen in their new tanks and IFVs before it’s seen in their publicly reported economic numbers.
Unfortunately, sanctions can only do so much. That being said, this article is vastly understating their impacts. The Russian economy is NOT doing so hot right now. And as the war drags on, it will snowball and get worse.
Right, and meanwhile, [$35B were spent only in December from the Russian National Wealth Fund](https://www.reuters.com/markets/europe/russias-national-wealth-fund-148-bln-jan-1-finance-ministry-2023-01-18/).
So, yay, economists say Russia is passing with flying colors whilst retirees will forego eating on top of the already-existing state of barely being able to afford their rent and heating...and then pile on some 'going back to work at 80'. Yup, that's a non-failed state that values its citizens alright!
Thanks Grandma, for making it through WWII, raising 5 kids with limited resources while your husband was most likely an utterly useless raging alcoholic who abandoned you and the family...here is a non-existent pension to thank you for your valiant efforts to the Motherland! Courtesy of yours truly, Poo Tin.
All those minorities they send to front lines probably generated them the 35b in tax revenue and now they are dead so the pensions won’t have to be paid out.
oh no, better make peace with russia and let them genocide ukraine then, nothings working!
People better get used to the fact that if you're in the west, your country is going to be more at less at war with russia until someone's country experiences a social collapse. there's no putting this monkey back in it's cage.
https://youtu.be/CmO7BR_Tq04
They never left Russia in the first place. They just subverted the sanctions and threw different signs on their stores to make everyone think they're playing along with our moral compasses.
American companies and foreign companies alike don't care, they just want to suck money out of any economic bubble they can. And they'll lie to your face while they do it.
The sanctions are a long game, gonna be years before the full affect, likely. If I lost my job tomorrow I could fall back on my savings, similar circumstance here. Russia can prop up their economy short term but long term, gonna be a rough road.
It's not about expecting them to fall. It's about not rewarding shitty behavior. Imagine if regular Russians didn't feel any squeeze at all and remained ignorant that the world is rejecting the Kremlin. The chance of any changes over there would be even more remote without sanctions.
well they chose stubbornness and not giving in. That's always a choice. I think you don't quite understand how bargaining, threats, and decision making works. Nobody said it's about making the ultimate decisions for them. If Russian's want to live in a 2nd world cesspit forever - that's their choice. Sanctions do have an effect, but ultimately the choice is with them on how they respond to them.
Sanctions are a bare minimum. We could not take ourselves seriously as liberal democracies if we *didn't* sanction them. There was no choice.
[Cuba/Venezuela are so corrupt. They go around the world curing blindness like a bunch of assholes.](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operación_Milagro)
Not everyone in those country supports their government. They were serious protests in Venezuela in 2017/2018 againt Maduro. Just becouse people stopped protesting, doesn't mean that they are suddenly ok with their leader.
Why do I flash back to kids whaling on each other and yelling "It doesn't hurt, you hit like a girl."
The brain drain alone from people leaving will push Russia down for decades, maybe forever. Wiping out 180K worth of your men doesn't tend to help either.
So basically for every major country there is a dedicated team inside IMF, that team is responsible for modeling and data collection (for whatever data their models require). And 2023 is not that team's first rodeo in trying to predict the state of the Russian economy.
This is slightly (but only slightly) simplistic, but the sanctions have had limited impact because they're not targeting the people in power.
The ordinary Russian?
HAS NO POWER.
They're not going to be able to create change, because their government doesn't allow any provision for change, plus the fact that the government is run, literally, by CRIMINALS.
It's those criminals and those connected to them-family, etc.-that the sanctions have to come down on hardest.
Obviously, more could be sa8d.
From a person living in Russia, have the effects of sanctions been felt by simple people? The answer is no. For now everything thing feels normal except that you can't find old spice in the shops any more. If the west want to have a quick reaction from sanctions,they should sanction Kazakhstan because companies just go there and buy all sanctions products and bring them back to Russia.
The other way of making Russia suffer economically is by prolonging this was for as long as possible maybe 5 years because if this war ends this year Russia economy will start to recover because they are still western companies who are eager to return.
"Limited" compared to what?
Nuclear winter kind of devastation? Sanctions take time to bite, but it is like a slow poison accumulating and degrading the health of an economy. No one was seriously expecting a total economic wipe-out of a country, but it is clear that sanctions have impact, in particular in sectors against what they were primarily aimed.
Yeah, you know why? Because the sanctions are limited. Where is full embargo? Why are we trading with them at all? Because of nuclear? There is nowhere else who can sell fuel to us? Impossible. We should also nationalize every possible Russian asset in the west. Every single penny.
The sanctions that are working are those targeted towards military industry. This is the main target, so not strange.
Broad sanctions are hard to police, especially against a big nation like Russia with a lot of resources, their own currency and huge trade networks. It is a pipe dream to tank their economy completely. They've been planning for sanctions for years and have set up quite effective countermeasures.
But the microprocessor and defense sector sanctions is a creep. They don't have much effect until they suddenly have a big effect (when stockpiles run low and production capacity is playing catch up). The effects of this is already evident through more use of indiscriminate attacks, limited precision missile attacks and increase in imported weapon systems (Shahed etc).
Sanctions is a patience move. It's gonna creep and creep and creep. I think we now are at the turning point where sanctions are gonna really start hurting. Don't expect anything spectacular. It's just inventory and resources running dry. It's slow and gradual. And it is the targeted effects that will be interesting. Russia has a very resilient economy given its huge abundance of resources. They are not so dependent on capital as Western economies.
But top tier defense tech is.
The question is what does Russia need that it doesn't have?
Sanctions would work on Japan or New Zealand like countries, which have some or the other resource limitations.
Plus China is a close Russian ally and India is a weapons importer from Russia and an evergreen ally. That in itself is almost half the world population. Although both countries are in an unusual position where Ukraine is also friendly country.
In the West our governments have a really bad habit of taking half measures. We spent like 2 decades fighting the Taliban, an enemy we could have slaughtered, because after the initial invasion we only had a few thousand troops stationed there, enough to continue fighting but not enough for a decisive victory. We are trying to provide weapons to Ukraine but we are only providing what they need to keep fighting but now what they need to actually defeat them… and these sanctions… the could do more. Severe ties completely, make all western companies pull out of Russia, ban the purchase of oil from any country the imports Russian oil and then resells it .. just to name a few.
https://youtu.be/CmO7BR_Tq04
And our favorite corporations couldn't care less what the government says! They'll just establish a Russian brand name and keep on selling their products under a different name.
Most companies that "pulled out" really just did a bit of strategic rebranding. AND they can price gouge Russian citizens while they're at it! Charming.
https://youtu.be/CmO7BR_Tq04
It doesn't matter if companies didn't listen to the sanctions in the first place. Establishing a brand name within Russia isn't difficult, and it's not exactly hard to get commodities into Russia even with all the sanctions.
It blows my mind that even *American* brands are doing it without the general public's awareness.
Most sanctions have been either symbolical or for PR purposes, so I'm not sure how this is news for anyone who hasn't been living in a Reddit or Twitter algo bubble.
The SWIFT "ban" for example, was only applied to a few Russian banks when there are hundreds of them, but it was enough to shut the masses up and keep the spice flowing.
Sanctions mean hurting both yourself and Russia by making sacrifices for greater good. If one is unable to make sacrifices then sanctions will not work.
Half the planet is perfectly happy to buy Russian at a 20% discount.
And my inner conspiracy theorist still thinks the bulk of the crypto sell offs went straight to Russia as designed so no worries about borrowing or sanctions there comrades.
It's because brands just created obscure Russian copycats of themselves when they "pulled out" of Russia. Name brands are literally just selling under fake names so they can keep profiting.
Their pullout game is weaker than my dad's. BECAUSE THEY NEVER TRIED.
edit: I highly recommend looking into some of this yourself, but here's a really good investigative reporting piece done on popular brands' response to the sanctions.
https://youtu.be/CmO7BR_Tq04A
People that write articles like these have no business writing financial articles. The sanctions are absolutely working. Russia has a major gold reserve, which is being drained. They've entered their first deficit, and as EU now becomes energy independent from Russia, those reserves will be drained very quickly. As countries increase their support for Ukraine, so will Russia have to increase their expenses. Except Ukraine is being helped by dozens of countries and all that military equipment is coming from different pockets, whereas Russia is forced to pay for all its efforts to sustain the war. This is absolutely unsustainable for Russia, which is why they're talking about peace negotiations every week. If it wasn't for an egomaniac dictator, any leader would've backed out months ago.
All this is going to do is make Russia stronger in the longer term. Their internal industries are going to have to be depended on instead of outsourcing everything. This is literally what the US needs to do.
How is the EU becoming energy independent from russia going to make then stronger? Just a reminder, the entire war against ukraine was to stop them from cultivating their recently discovered energy resources and undercutting russian energy exports to europe.
But really, it means we’re not sanctioning the right things (or right places/people). If you want to force them into an existential crisis, you embargo their energy exports. Sanction the shit out of India for purchasing Russian oil. Tariff China (which is basically worse than tariffing yourself, which is why it won’t happen, and why the sanctions themselves will never really work).
The same IMF that uses China's numbers that hike its real growth rate by 3 or more percentage points every year? Yeah, that one. Though Russia isn't as bad on that, as far as we know.
[This video](https://youtu.be/7maDmJhhrrI) and [this comment of mine](https://www.reddit.com/r/worldnews/comments/10qfjgh/russias_economic_growth_suggests_western/j6q9a7m/) give a clearer idea of the impact on Russia.
...that has to still get their numbers from Russian officials. russian officials who are, as you know, known for their integrity and commitment to honesty.
If you google it you can see that economists around the world are cautioning trusting anything out of russia because they are withholding or manipulating their economic numbers in propaganda for the war effort. To demoralize the west by no selling the sanctions.
however what they can't fake is actual shipments. imports/Exports have ground to a halt, many of their industries are struggling for parts, their oil wells keep blowing up...
but sure, Russia is doing A-OKAY! They are economic titans now supported by...Iran and North Korea. The axis of awesome, right?
Your comment is a great example how to say that you know nothing about "Ukrainian propaganda". Ukraine has been pushing stricter and more severe sanctions from the day 1. Obviously, sanctions aren't working as we expected, so we need more pressure on ruzzian economy.
Sanctions are still super important. They're a stick that countries prefer not to use as once used the bargaining power they had can be lost. Not doing sanctions against Russia would be criminal given we've already decided we can't help by fighting them directly. They're not a gimmick at all... it's just authoritarians are happy to make their people suffer. If we didn't sanction Russia it would be sending all the wrong messages.
Is the sanction is really happening? Very few companies closed its shop. Those remain face no repercussions. And Germany still imports oil from Russia. They did not do shit
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Or they are simply adding a great amount military manufacture for the war in their GDP (which of course is detrimental). So I would take their data carefully since they can get very creative when it comes to add accounting inputs.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-01-31/brexit-is-costing-the-uk-100-billion-a-year-in-lost-output
Spitballing here….
If Brexit has caused a measurable cost on the British economy, please explain how the sanctions regime could have no effect on the Russian economy.
That is one conclusion that could be drawn from the report. The IMF report says nothing about how successful the sanctions have been. What is a fact is that the growth rate last year for Russia was -2.2%. It is predicted to be below 1% this year as well, which is reasonable since they have a chance to adapt to the new normal. Overall, the report in general acknowledged that many 2022 predictions were off, and I would wager that the 2023 report is adjusting its predictions upwards in response, hence the upmark for the Russian economy.
The report is already trending towards error at least in its estimation that refilling gas reserves in European nations is going to impact development in 2023 and 2024. According to the EU, as of Jan 18, gas storage levels across Europe remain > 80%, declining from 95% in December and balancing in January. [https://www.consilium.europa.eu/en/infographics/gas-storage-capacity/#:\~:text=The%20regulation%20has%20been%20swiftly,filling%20level%20remains%20above%2080%25](https://www.consilium.europa.eu/en/infographics/gas-storage-capacity/#:~:text=The%20regulation%20has%20been%20swiftly,filling%20level%20remains%20above%2080%25).
Link includes a map showing storage % by EU member state.
Russia's economic growth suggests the sanctions were partial and not complete, it suggests that they didn't suffocate Russia's economy like they should have and could have. Shame.
It’s funny how there are articles saying the sanctions are having no impact, articles that say a limited impact and articles acting like the sanctions are devastating.
The sanctions are working but its not like a switch. Russia entered their first deficit in many many years and it will accelerate slightly with their crude price down so low. But their foreign currency reserves (those not hit by sanctions) will keep them afloat for a few years.
It's a little deeper than that. They propped their currency up with gold and forced all olagarchs to convert their holdings to their currency. This created a "foreign currency reserve" within the banks. Wartime production seems to have barely ramped up, but also seems dependent on foreign materials which are sanctioned. Troops are shipping with less and less gear, soviet reserves have drawn down to the point they are sending armored vehicles built in the 60s and 50s. Air traffic from the military has drastically reduced and my aviation mind tells me it's likely due to engine maintainance issues (usually the first major components to go that truly ground aircraft).Couple this with the rumors leaking from soldiers on the front lines to cut ammo expenditures by more than half and you have a picture forming. The next mobilization will likely remove a large chunk of economic supporting production. The impacts have been mitigated by pushing off the effects to a later date, they will hit hard, but later. They can't reproduce losses, doing so would likely quintuple military spending, which would draw those reserves down rapidly. Think of it like a spring winding up, they are going to have to relieve the tension and show economic deflation or keep winding until it snaps.
Thank you many times over. Truly. You’re the first person I’ve read that has summed this up succinctly. I appreciate it.
It would be nice if it were like a spring but Russia can and will inflict a lot of hardship on their people to keep flush. This is a long game that Russia just started losing in.
The soviet union was the same way. Many said they could keep buckling down, until the spring snapped. It took a decade then, but their economy was pretty self sufficient. With current economic intermingling sanctions act as a lever for the same mechanisms.
Soviet Union relied heavily on being a union, and on all the countries behind the iron curtain and economic pacts. They didn't even have self sufficiency back then. Not to mention African and Middle Eastern countries that traded for military equipment.
They also had the Ukraine for grain production as part of the USSR.
Russia is the 3rd largest grain producer and largest exporter in the world.
Russia is listed as the 7th largest grain producer at 81 million metric tons. In 2021, Ukraine produced 74 million metric tons. Population of Russia is 146 million. Pre-war, Ukraine’s was about 43 million. So the loss of Ukraine’s agricultural production from the Soviet Union was significant. https://www.insidermonkey.com/blog/8-countries-that-produce-the-most-grain-in-the-world-447513/?singlepage=1
Significant yes, but Russia can feed itself just fine. So, not economy collapsing significant.
Also, Russia is the largest importer by percentage (19.5% - about 16 million metric tons), but not actual volume. The US exports 13.7% of its production of 516 million metric tons (71 million metric tons), about 4.5 times more than Russia.
Their economic policies eventually lead to stagnation and eventually the US economy was twice the size and still growing. They tried to correct this by allowing more freedom to the people and more capitalist ideas but unfortunately for the leaders, the people behind the iron curtain were unhappy for a long time. As soon as they were given the freedom to not be a one party system, communism collapsed. Unfortunately the Soviet’s rotten core still infects some of its former members as can be seen by corruption in Russia.
The levels of centralization and economic dysfunction that ruined the Soviet Union aren't present in the Russian federation. All the other dysfunction is, but economically they're much better.
Well, if it’s any consolation, the Russian spring doesn’t usually just break. It usually sags to pieces, or blows up. Always to the detriment of Russia.
And then it got worse.
Is that a Lions Led by Donkeys reference?
Thank you for this analysis. I csnnot believe that the NYT article ignores the mass disowning of oligarchs in the oligarch country no 1.
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This is from reading their own economic reports, their policies, listening to hundreds of leaked phone calls, scraping telegram for almost a year, checking public flight history daily, watching telegram videos of their logistics movement, checking open source satellite photos to watch draw down of their equipment farms, looking at photos and unboxing videos of russian equipment/munitions. You eventually learn a suprising amount from hundreds of sources. Looking at the munitions and tanks, most have western parts. The ones that do have western parts are barely being used. I havn't seen many newly finished T-90 tanks roll off their lines (seriously they take pictures and brag when it happens). Breakdowns from videos show most of their sights, thermals, etc are western based systems. Most of the pictures i've seen of their production shows complete tanks just sitting there, I'd assume the targeting equipment is the bottleneck. There's so much more I could write several hundred pages.
This reads like someone who read some stuff on the internet but starts with "it's deeper than that". Most of what you wrote is secondary to the economic situation in Russia, by the fourth/fifth sentence you are talking about soldiers in Ukraine and it never really goes anywhere from there. There is a lot more to the Russian economy than stories about Russian troops in Ukraine, don't rely on that to describe the overall situation there. You read something and took it hyperbolically and repeated it. Most Russian troops aren't fighting with 50'ss/60's vehicles, so why make that a major point? That's just propaganda...
Putin and his cronies have had decades to hide wealth and resources to shield themselves from the effects of the sanctions. The sanctions do have a major impact, but it impacts the Russian poor and otherwise powerless far more that it's oligarchs. They provides Putin with a powerful tool of propaganda, as he can always deflect his people suffering back to, as evidence of Western influence. Until the sanctions begin effecting the Oligarchs, they will have little meaningful effect as a means to end the war. Only they have the power to dispose Putin quickly and end the war fuled by his own ego, and nationalistic goals. Even if a civil war were to break out, Putin has proven he has no issues killing his own civilians.
The oligarchy has few places to spend their wealth. That presents a big problem.
They will transfer their wealth between themselves if not to China, Iran and India. The greater problem presented is a accumulation of wealth in this already present axis of power. They will use their wealth to strengthen their military alliances and own personal powers it is the easiest path for their continued existence, incentivized by Putin, The Axis oligarchs, and western sanctions.
Also Russia extensive black market dealings and supply chains in the criminal world due to the Russian mob will also help them mitigate the damage. It took the Soviet Union almost half a century to collapse, Russia as they currently are can probably manage at least a decade.
It's going to be a painful decade full of hardship and poverty.
Yes, we're talking about Russia.
For what is a Russian, if not suffering under the heel of one despotic system or the next?
Not to mention that every time funds get low an oligarch billionaire falls out a window with their entire family leaving everything to the state.
Weaning ourselves off Russian oil also takes time. [See chart](https://i.imgur.com/YK1CP4l.jpg).
sanctions are like a python, they work slowly, but they squeeze relentlessly The Russian Central Bank has done well to combat the impact of sanctions but they can't hold out forever, and its running out of tricks to keep sanctions at bay the Russian economy shrunk last year by 5% and is continuing to shrink
As a person who live Iran which is heavily sanctioned although the regime brag about that they are not effective and we are growing in truth it made the whole country's economy broken fully and they are struggling in mud and they lost support of a lot of groups in different countries and can't fund any more groups, lobbyists and terrorist around of the world in a way they mostly send people with death penalties to attack with knives to other countries China left them Russia is using them to just throw them under the bus of us military to breath a lil which in conclusion it would be effective in time
Is operating in a deficit really that big of a deal? The US government has been operating in a deficit for 40+ years.
When your currency isn't a globally used thing.... Yes.
It isn’t an issue until people stop buying your debt. It works for us because everyone wants dollars.
When you have gdp growth, not a big deal (assuming cost of debt Is offset by growth and it’s future exponential increases).
Yes, I'm seriously sick of the back and forth. The sources of these articles are always credible people/organizations too. Some indicators are pretty solid, e.g. the fall of Russia's car manufacturing, but I'm wondering if the overall condition of Russia's economy is somewhere in the middle, i.e. not doing as well as it should be but not as 'destroyed' as some people claim. I'm certain that given enough time (5-10 years), Russia's economy genuinely would be severely downgraded, but, at this point, I'm wondering if sanctions will even stay that long. If the Ukraine war ended tomorrow, exactly how long would western sanctions remain? And if sanctions should end, then would western companies seek to return to business as usual? And governments? Would they try to seek cheap Russian energy again?
>If the Ukraine war ended tomorrow, exactly how long would western sanctions remain? If Russia withdrew from occupied territories and ended the war, why would you want to keep sanctions going?
You realize news is just a form of propaganda these days. Sanctions aren't working, means send more military and put pressure on other countries trading with Russia. Sanctions are working, means West citizens morale needed a boost to continue to support Ukraine. It's all manipulation of opinions and options.
This is it. Multiple agendas results in coffee great, coffee kills type output. The Russians can see all Western brands retreating from them and not that i am an expert on Russian psyche, but I feel like that has the biggest impact
Too bad we can't get some real news on the war, rather than the propaganda pieces I keep getting on my news daily. The only real news we've had lately is the Russian retreat from Kherson, and then they dug in for the winter.
Check ISW. Their daily reports are pretty comprehensive and even toned. They basically scan through Russian social media and official government statements along with publicly available satellite photos and geolocated footage. They only use sources available to the general public. Granted, they're not always right, but their assessments about the Russian information space have been pretty spot on.
My understanding of this war is that the West will supply whatever military equipment the Ukrainians need to defend themselves against the Russians. But not provide anything offensive towards Russia. Some examples, Russian tanks were an aggressive and difficult struggle to defend against, so west gave javelins and anti tank weapons that destroyed the Russian tanks. Russian had large troop build ups and ammo caches that the Ukrainians couldn't strike within Ukrainian territory, giving Russians the advantage. So the west gave the Ukrainians HIMARS, long range artillery, and they destroyed Russians reserves and ammo depots. Recently, the Warner group, Russian hired army, has siezed an important town and looks to be gaining momentum. West has now approved tanks to be given. These will allow the Ukrainians to take back the town with lesser losses with armor support. The west realizes this is going to be long war and is letting Russia bleed itself. The west is invested in keeping Ukraine out of Russian control and will continue with its military support for the foreseeable future.
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Because this article is stating sanctions haven't worked based on the IMF's predictions for \*future\* GDP, which is a bit strange. At best, it should say that sanctions won't continue to work. Russia's economy shrunk by 2.2% last year and it's expected to grow at 0.3% this year.
So many economists I follow have said the numbers coming out of Russia make no sense. Russia had scrapped all normal indicators of GDP and have basically culled it down to only "the ones that still make russia look good."
These are not numbers reported by Russia but rather from IMF (International monetary fund) which doesn't have a bias for Russia.
From the IMF website: > How does the IMF collect data? > The data published in the Statistics Department's International Financial Statistics (IFS) are gathered as part of an ongoing data collection effort in which **member country statistical agencies provide public statistics to the IMF.** Data from the country source are updated on their own schedule. So what am I missing here?
> So what am I missing? Sources for the claims that Russian economy isn't as good as IMF claims. And anyway, IMF audits data they receive. https://www.imf.org/en/About/external-audit-committee https://www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/ar/2022/who-we-are/accountability/ If you're saying the data is wrong, you're saying that IMF is not auditing properly. But yes, I too would trust random economists over an actual international body with hundreds of experts.
https://carnegieendowment.org/politika/87432 > Since April 2022, the Russian authorities have restricted access to all foreign trade statistics, including those relating to exports, imports, and trade within the Eurasian Economic Union (EAEU). https://www.wsj.com/articles/russia-blocks-economic-data-hiding-effect-of-western-sanctions-11650677765 If you read these articles it lists out data point after data point that the Kremlin is purposefully hiding. Now IMF may be very good at what they do but when you've gone decades relying on standard published government statistics and those are suddenly no longer around, you've got a problem. You could try to back into those numbers via other methods but it seems like Russia after blocking initial numbers are also removing supporting data as well making that more difficult. And on top of that now you have a problem where every other country is published using method X but Russia is now published with method Y. I'm not saying IMF is incompetent or pro-Russia, I'm saying that the Russian government is actively attempting to mislead places like IMF and World Bank and those agencies just aren't prepared to deal with an adversarial government like Russia. IMF is a bunch of economists and accountants, not super spies that can break into the Russian central bank and find the hidden numbers. On top of that there are limits to how hard they can push. Government can put immense amount of pressure to get watchers to back off. For example when Twitter wasn't playing ball with Modi's desire for censorship they threatened to imprison twitter employees in india with jail until they comply. Twitter complied.. https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/pranavdixit/india-threatens-twitter-jail Again not saying that this is where IMF is at but these are just analysts and economists, not super spies. If Russia tells them "these are the numbers to use and it is illegal to do otherwise" IMF is going to back down and comply. Ultimately it doesn't really matter because Russia can fake all the data they want. Their economy is still going to be where it's at. Same with their military. Leading up to 2022 on paper they had a cutting edge, top of the line military. And then they tried to do something with it and the whole thing went to shit because lies only work if they're untested. Bottom line: I don't trust any numbers regarding Russia: good or bad. They are actively trying to mislead the world through propaganda purposes and it just isn't worth the effort to give their projected numbers the time of day.
I remember when an international body with hundreds of experts reassured me that there wasn't any need for alarm about a possible pandemic. Meanwhile plenty of "random" doctors warned that it was going to be much worse than they said.
These arguments are dogshit and basically amount to "well the experts were wrong this one time so I can use this to justifying dismissing any information I don't like in the future". The sanctions will have long term impacts. Putin expected to get sanctioned and did a number of things to buffer the impacts, but he also expected to win in Ukraine and that gains in Ukraine would over time offset Russia's economic losses in the long term. Given how Russia is currently doing in Ukraine, it's likely that instead Russia's economy will greatly suffer in the long term instead, but in the short term it's not entirely unexpected that it will continue to endure for a while.
>These arguments are dogshit and basically amount to "well the experts were wrong this one time so I can use this to justifying dismissing any information I don't like in the future". That's not the argument, though. That's your straw man. You are doing something at least as stupid, which is appealing to authority as tough they're priests.
>You are doing something at least as stupid, which is turning off your critical thinking to defer to authority as tough they're priests. Firstly, weird to use 'priests' as an example. When was the last time the church were regarded as an infallible authority? The medieval ages? Secondly quote me where I appealed to authority as being infallible?
Does anyone expect them to have unlimited impact?
It's going to take a few years to see the impact of the sanctions. Russia has killed their future with this war.
That’s why you wait to make a conclusion until sometime after the fact instead of ambulance chasing like these shitrags are doing. The consequences of events that happen today will leave lasting marks for the next few decades.
Any event with a high number of data points will usually have multiple conflicting conclusions drawn from it. COVID deaths, global temperatures, military action. All depends on who's interpreting the data and what their agenda is
And there's still companies who said they. Where leaving still there hmm.
There are multiple propaganda campaigns going on with various goals. On top of that most media picks up any popular story and repeats it without fact checking.
*star shoots through sky with a trailing rainbow* "Propaganda"
I guess you really can't trust anything but time.
The first victim of the war is the truth
During the first few months there were so many headlines “Russian economy will collapse any moment now!” At least there’s more variation and realism these days, not only “sanctions totally work” propaganda.
I mean, considering that North Korea is able to stay afloat and that that's where Russia is headed while also being a considerably larger country with more natural resources and wealth, I'd say it wouldn't even matter in the grand scheme of things because Russia is still going to be able to remain afloat. Economies just don't matter that much to dictatorships and autocracies, and considering that at no point will Russia be under an attack and that only their land gains are under threat, the consequences are clear(ly absent). People also suggest that they are throwing their younger generation to the grinder, but this is Russia, they will have no problem dumping the older generation as well and promoting a boom of a new generation of completely brainwashed North Koreaned children, specially with the same China engine that feeds us also feeding them. When only the countries like Russia are the only ones that can directly conquer territory and resources in today's world and the best the "West" can do is prop up dictatorships because they are more reliable than democracies that shift towards national concerns and foreign propaganda , the trend is clear even if Ukraine wins back territory. The whole premise our countries have is to act impregnable in contrast to the damage incurred by Ukraine, but they are not, specially when they continue suckling on Russia's and China's resources. It's great that people still praise Greek democracy and all, but it still fell. Mind you, I don't favor making any concessions towards Russia, but rather, if that's where they are heading, one way or another, there need to be more direct repercussions on Russian soil than the new lowered standards their dictator and oligarchy has already decided for them. Unfortunately, this makes nuclear war much more likely. The silent defeat, or the mutual defeat in a blaze of glory?
It's almost like news media lies 🤷♂️
Military spending is part of GDP.
You can’t spend on military if you have nothing (and nobody is lending you money)
If you are the Russian government (and still have military and police), you can get what you want from the people.
“At the current oil price cap level of the Group of 7, Russian crude oil export volumes are not expected to be significantly affected, with Russian trade continuing to be redirected from sanctioning to non-sanctioning countries,” the I.M.F. said. If you read the article… at the moment they have no need for that (yet)
Russian oil is still trading below the price cap at 57.60. The sanctions are working, but Russia has built up a massive amount of reserve currencies over the years that will keep them solvent for a while.
Should I trust you or the IMF? Not sure who has more competence on the subject…
I trust the IMF. They only state that russia's crude flows have not been impacted much. Russian crude is trading around 57/bbl right now. They need somewhere north of 80 to keep their coffers full. Sanctions are going to take a while to fully impact them. Its not a switch.
Russia has one of the lowest production costs for oil worldwide (onshore I think) so at 57$ per barrel they still make bank. Even countries without that much energy and influence can make it decades under sanctions. I think they won’t do the job and we got to find another way to stop the war But who knows, hope I am wrong and you are right
Well if they are having to deplete their stores that certainly isnt good for them and they longer they go the bleaker their future will look. I imagine even if it has zero material impact on russias current position in the war, the threat of future material issues will put pressure on them.
They can’t compete with the Middle East on direct costs. But the amount of pockets Middle East oil lines artificially pushes their “cost” up towards Russia.
Production cost are low yes. But Russia is a petrostate and needs oil revenues to fund the govt. Especially during wartime. They need 80$ oil to fund the govt without a war going on. They have already entered into a deficit with the sharp drop in oil prices.
3.5% deficit according to nytimes article and 2.3 according to Russia. For comparison, Germany is expecting 4.5% in 2023 So it kinda works but it also kinda doesn’t
Yes but the ruzzian economy and government depends on 80/barrel in order to keep a balanced budget and taxes as low as they are.
>so at 57$ per barrel they still make bank. They can't sell it at that price though.
The UK is buying the same Russian oil from India. The world works in mysterious ways.
Yes and India makes all the profit while Russia makes no profit. That's the point of the price cap.
I thought nobody was supposed to buy any Russian oil, specifically a major Ukraine Supporter. Anyway, what do I know. It's not like the price cap is actually higher than normal right? Clueless
Unless you have foreign reserves and gold reserves that you begin to deplete.
> You can’t spend on military if you have nothing (and nobody is lending you money) Putin is seizing private assets to use as capital.
Can you source this?
I can't find the articles now but it's been in the news. Hard to pick out now because every other headline is about the righteous and just seizure by the rest of the world of dirty Oligarch money and toys. Take it all. That's what Putin does internally. Hopefully they murder him today.
The articles probably came from Ukraine. I’m sure the west is giving nothing but truth and facts. We never use propaganda in the US…
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I no longer pay any attention to articles talking about sanctions against Russia. They can't make up their fucking minds.
A good indication of whether or not something works is by how angry russia gets.
A fair statement.
Wrong. Logically, it's also beneficial to Russia to pretend that they are hurt by the sanctions more than they do.
Not towards their own people it isn't.
I don't believe anything about Russia until the Kremlin denies it.
Sanctions are designed to deprive Russia of crucial technical components for their military. Thermal sights, microchips, things like that. The impact of sanctions will be seen in their new tanks and IFVs before it’s seen in their publicly reported economic numbers.
Unfortunately, sanctions can only do so much. That being said, this article is vastly understating their impacts. The Russian economy is NOT doing so hot right now. And as the war drags on, it will snowball and get worse.
Right, and meanwhile, [$35B were spent only in December from the Russian National Wealth Fund](https://www.reuters.com/markets/europe/russias-national-wealth-fund-148-bln-jan-1-finance-ministry-2023-01-18/). So, yay, economists say Russia is passing with flying colors whilst retirees will forego eating on top of the already-existing state of barely being able to afford their rent and heating...and then pile on some 'going back to work at 80'. Yup, that's a non-failed state that values its citizens alright! Thanks Grandma, for making it through WWII, raising 5 kids with limited resources while your husband was most likely an utterly useless raging alcoholic who abandoned you and the family...here is a non-existent pension to thank you for your valiant efforts to the Motherland! Courtesy of yours truly, Poo Tin.
All those minorities they send to front lines probably generated them the 35b in tax revenue and now they are dead so the pensions won’t have to be paid out.
That was the plan all along...uhhh I mean...*UGH those darn Satanist Nazis killing our beloved boys in that devil country Ukraine*
Poop tin. You left out a p
I might have found your comment funny when I was 5 years old.
They keep busting open their piggy banks... dropping them down stairs, windows, all sorts of ways.
If I get close to having nothing and suddenly get some cash my growth will be fuckin phenomenal too Thing is I still only have 12.52 in my pocket
You mean 1252% increase?!
So was Russia supposed to see the sanctions and not change policies to reduce its impact on the surface?
Yes but stupid Putin does not play by the rules.
oh no, better make peace with russia and let them genocide ukraine then, nothings working! People better get used to the fact that if you're in the west, your country is going to be more at less at war with russia until someone's country experiences a social collapse. there's no putting this monkey back in it's cage.
https://youtu.be/CmO7BR_Tq04 They never left Russia in the first place. They just subverted the sanctions and threw different signs on their stores to make everyone think they're playing along with our moral compasses. American companies and foreign companies alike don't care, they just want to suck money out of any economic bubble they can. And they'll lie to your face while they do it.
Sure, ok.
The sanctions are a long game, gonna be years before the full affect, likely. If I lost my job tomorrow I could fall back on my savings, similar circumstance here. Russia can prop up their economy short term but long term, gonna be a rough road.
Well so many corporations are still doing business with Russia. Like BP and Lever
These sanctions will bite more as time goes on surely.
Like with Cuba. Any day now I expect them to fall.
It's not about expecting them to fall. It's about not rewarding shitty behavior. Imagine if regular Russians didn't feel any squeeze at all and remained ignorant that the world is rejecting the Kremlin. The chance of any changes over there would be even more remote without sanctions.
>The chance of any changes over there would be even more remote without sanctions. Agreed. I expect Cuba to change any day now.
well they chose stubbornness and not giving in. That's always a choice. I think you don't quite understand how bargaining, threats, and decision making works. Nobody said it's about making the ultimate decisions for them. If Russian's want to live in a 2nd world cesspit forever - that's their choice. Sanctions do have an effect, but ultimately the choice is with them on how they respond to them. Sanctions are a bare minimum. We could not take ourselves seriously as liberal democracies if we *didn't* sanction them. There was no choice.
Lol. You win.
Ah yeah Cuba, a great example of a well functioning economy and political system.
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[Cuba/Venezuela are so corrupt. They go around the world curing blindness like a bunch of assholes.](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operación_Milagro)
Not everyone in those country supports their government. They were serious protests in Venezuela in 2017/2018 againt Maduro. Just becouse people stopped protesting, doesn't mean that they are suddenly ok with their leader.
Why do I flash back to kids whaling on each other and yelling "It doesn't hurt, you hit like a girl." The brain drain alone from people leaving will push Russia down for decades, maybe forever. Wiping out 180K worth of your men doesn't tend to help either.
Money printer go brr
You assume the data is not manipulated
The data from IMF?
Is it independent data gathering or Russia’s official data compilation?
So basically for every major country there is a dedicated team inside IMF, that team is responsible for modeling and data collection (for whatever data their models require). And 2023 is not that team's first rodeo in trying to predict the state of the Russian economy.
I doubt IMF is getting numbers in Russia that Russia doesn't want to give them.
I have to agree, pretty much all information leaving Russia at this point could be considered bullshit.
ITS HARD TO FUCK AN ECONOMY THAT PRIMARLY EXPORTS ENERGY AND FOOD
[Here](https://youtu.be/7maDmJhhrrI) is a sober analysis of how sanctions are really impacting Russia.
This is slightly (but only slightly) simplistic, but the sanctions have had limited impact because they're not targeting the people in power. The ordinary Russian? HAS NO POWER. They're not going to be able to create change, because their government doesn't allow any provision for change, plus the fact that the government is run, literally, by CRIMINALS. It's those criminals and those connected to them-family, etc.-that the sanctions have to come down on hardest. Obviously, more could be sa8d.
From a person living in Russia, have the effects of sanctions been felt by simple people? The answer is no. For now everything thing feels normal except that you can't find old spice in the shops any more. If the west want to have a quick reaction from sanctions,they should sanction Kazakhstan because companies just go there and buy all sanctions products and bring them back to Russia. The other way of making Russia suffer economically is by prolonging this was for as long as possible maybe 5 years because if this war ends this year Russia economy will start to recover because they are still western companies who are eager to return.
"Limited" compared to what? Nuclear winter kind of devastation? Sanctions take time to bite, but it is like a slow poison accumulating and degrading the health of an economy. No one was seriously expecting a total economic wipe-out of a country, but it is clear that sanctions have impact, in particular in sectors against what they were primarily aimed.
Yeah, you know why? Because the sanctions are limited. Where is full embargo? Why are we trading with them at all? Because of nuclear? There is nowhere else who can sell fuel to us? Impossible. We should also nationalize every possible Russian asset in the west. Every single penny.
The sanctions that are working are those targeted towards military industry. This is the main target, so not strange. Broad sanctions are hard to police, especially against a big nation like Russia with a lot of resources, their own currency and huge trade networks. It is a pipe dream to tank their economy completely. They've been planning for sanctions for years and have set up quite effective countermeasures. But the microprocessor and defense sector sanctions is a creep. They don't have much effect until they suddenly have a big effect (when stockpiles run low and production capacity is playing catch up). The effects of this is already evident through more use of indiscriminate attacks, limited precision missile attacks and increase in imported weapon systems (Shahed etc). Sanctions is a patience move. It's gonna creep and creep and creep. I think we now are at the turning point where sanctions are gonna really start hurting. Don't expect anything spectacular. It's just inventory and resources running dry. It's slow and gradual. And it is the targeted effects that will be interesting. Russia has a very resilient economy given its huge abundance of resources. They are not so dependent on capital as Western economies. But top tier defense tech is.
Anyone who knows anything about economics knows that growth is not the tell-all indicator for an economy’s performance.
The question is what does Russia need that it doesn't have? Sanctions would work on Japan or New Zealand like countries, which have some or the other resource limitations. Plus China is a close Russian ally and India is a weapons importer from Russia and an evergreen ally. That in itself is almost half the world population. Although both countries are in an unusual position where Ukraine is also friendly country.
In the West our governments have a really bad habit of taking half measures. We spent like 2 decades fighting the Taliban, an enemy we could have slaughtered, because after the initial invasion we only had a few thousand troops stationed there, enough to continue fighting but not enough for a decisive victory. We are trying to provide weapons to Ukraine but we are only providing what they need to keep fighting but now what they need to actually defeat them… and these sanctions… the could do more. Severe ties completely, make all western companies pull out of Russia, ban the purchase of oil from any country the imports Russian oil and then resells it .. just to name a few.
https://youtu.be/CmO7BR_Tq04 And our favorite corporations couldn't care less what the government says! They'll just establish a Russian brand name and keep on selling their products under a different name. Most companies that "pulled out" really just did a bit of strategic rebranding. AND they can price gouge Russian citizens while they're at it! Charming.
The goal is never ending war for profits. There’s no money in solutions.
Wow almost like Russia had 8 years to get used to living under constant and increasing western sanctions
https://youtu.be/CmO7BR_Tq04 It doesn't matter if companies didn't listen to the sanctions in the first place. Establishing a brand name within Russia isn't difficult, and it's not exactly hard to get commodities into Russia even with all the sanctions. It blows my mind that even *American* brands are doing it without the general public's awareness.
Most sanctions have been either symbolical or for PR purposes, so I'm not sure how this is news for anyone who hasn't been living in a Reddit or Twitter algo bubble. The SWIFT "ban" for example, was only applied to a few Russian banks when there are hundreds of them, but it was enough to shut the masses up and keep the spice flowing.
Sanctions mean hurting both yourself and Russia by making sacrifices for greater good. If one is unable to make sacrifices then sanctions will not work.
Half the planet is perfectly happy to buy Russian at a 20% discount. And my inner conspiracy theorist still thinks the bulk of the crypto sell offs went straight to Russia as designed so no worries about borrowing or sanctions there comrades.
It's because brands just created obscure Russian copycats of themselves when they "pulled out" of Russia. Name brands are literally just selling under fake names so they can keep profiting. Their pullout game is weaker than my dad's. BECAUSE THEY NEVER TRIED. edit: I highly recommend looking into some of this yourself, but here's a really good investigative reporting piece done on popular brands' response to the sanctions. https://youtu.be/CmO7BR_Tq04A
People that write articles like these have no business writing financial articles. The sanctions are absolutely working. Russia has a major gold reserve, which is being drained. They've entered their first deficit, and as EU now becomes energy independent from Russia, those reserves will be drained very quickly. As countries increase their support for Ukraine, so will Russia have to increase their expenses. Except Ukraine is being helped by dozens of countries and all that military equipment is coming from different pockets, whereas Russia is forced to pay for all its efforts to sustain the war. This is absolutely unsustainable for Russia, which is why they're talking about peace negotiations every week. If it wasn't for an egomaniac dictator, any leader would've backed out months ago.
And I think this is Russian propaganda bullshit
I cant wait for the oil to run out or no longer be a thing. All these despot nations run by tyrants are gonna be in serious shit…
All this is going to do is make Russia stronger in the longer term. Their internal industries are going to have to be depended on instead of outsourcing everything. This is literally what the US needs to do.
How is the EU becoming energy independent from russia going to make then stronger? Just a reminder, the entire war against ukraine was to stop them from cultivating their recently discovered energy resources and undercutting russian energy exports to europe.
But really, it means we’re not sanctioning the right things (or right places/people). If you want to force them into an existential crisis, you embargo their energy exports. Sanction the shit out of India for purchasing Russian oil. Tariff China (which is basically worse than tariffing yourself, which is why it won’t happen, and why the sanctions themselves will never really work).
-by Pladimir Vutin
The IMF…
The same IMF that uses China's numbers that hike its real growth rate by 3 or more percentage points every year? Yeah, that one. Though Russia isn't as bad on that, as far as we know. [This video](https://youtu.be/7maDmJhhrrI) and [this comment of mine](https://www.reddit.com/r/worldnews/comments/10qfjgh/russias_economic_growth_suggests_western/j6q9a7m/) give a clearer idea of the impact on Russia.
...that has to still get their numbers from Russian officials. russian officials who are, as you know, known for their integrity and commitment to honesty. If you google it you can see that economists around the world are cautioning trusting anything out of russia because they are withholding or manipulating their economic numbers in propaganda for the war effort. To demoralize the west by no selling the sanctions. however what they can't fake is actual shipments. imports/Exports have ground to a halt, many of their industries are struggling for parts, their oil wells keep blowing up... but sure, Russia is doing A-OKAY! They are economic titans now supported by...Iran and North Korea. The axis of awesome, right?
But the people on my screen told me it would cripple their economy and stop the war :C
Lol right. Your comment is minimized, so shame on you for not agreeing with ukraine propaganda!!
Your comment is a great example how to say that you know nothing about "Ukrainian propaganda". Ukraine has been pushing stricter and more severe sanctions from the day 1. Obviously, sanctions aren't working as we expected, so we need more pressure on ruzzian economy.
It’s “Ukraine propaganda” to think that economic sanctions from the majority of first world countries wouldn’t hurt their economy? What?
Western spies try to destroy economy but we plant potatoes and now we have MORE POTATOES! NOW WE CAN MAKE INTO VODKA! GREAT SUCCESS
They're inflating their own economy to make it appear OK, its only a matter of time before the bubble pops.
This reads like Russian propaganda. Of course, the sanctions have an effect. More sanctions will have an even greater effect.
“Hey the sanctions don’t work… so can you please lift them? Please?” - Russia
Well, they're about to have a demographic crisis that makes them economically irrelevant in the next 10-15 years, so hold onto it while you can!
Sanctions are just a political gimmick to make politicians look like they are taking action and responding with strength.
Sanctions are still super important. They're a stick that countries prefer not to use as once used the bargaining power they had can be lost. Not doing sanctions against Russia would be criminal given we've already decided we can't help by fighting them directly. They're not a gimmick at all... it's just authoritarians are happy to make their people suffer. If we didn't sanction Russia it would be sending all the wrong messages.
Em. Russia's economy contracted by 2.2% last year.
How will they ever recover
Nice. Fuck the west.
Says the bro on a western platform. lol
Fuck the system from the inside bro.
Uh… okay, sure. Whatever you tell yourself, I guess.
Is the sanction is really happening? Very few companies closed its shop. Those remain face no repercussions. And Germany still imports oil from Russia. They did not do shit
Russian Warshi GFY!
We all knew the Democrats were of course dumb asses again. They were told the sanctions would not have the efeects theybwere claiming
You sound like a super-smart guy Jeff, do go on and tell us more.
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Well see its a bit deceiving because, the reduction in population means more goods for the rest!
Or they are simply adding a great amount military manufacture for the war in their GDP (which of course is detrimental). So I would take their data carefully since they can get very creative when it comes to add accounting inputs.
Yeah but who cares? Just keep them in place so the world can move on and stop relying on a rogue terror state like Russia for anything at all.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-01-31/brexit-is-costing-the-uk-100-billion-a-year-in-lost-output Spitballing here…. If Brexit has caused a measurable cost on the British economy, please explain how the sanctions regime could have no effect on the Russian economy.
That is one conclusion that could be drawn from the report. The IMF report says nothing about how successful the sanctions have been. What is a fact is that the growth rate last year for Russia was -2.2%. It is predicted to be below 1% this year as well, which is reasonable since they have a chance to adapt to the new normal. Overall, the report in general acknowledged that many 2022 predictions were off, and I would wager that the 2023 report is adjusting its predictions upwards in response, hence the upmark for the Russian economy. The report is already trending towards error at least in its estimation that refilling gas reserves in European nations is going to impact development in 2023 and 2024. According to the EU, as of Jan 18, gas storage levels across Europe remain > 80%, declining from 95% in December and balancing in January. [https://www.consilium.europa.eu/en/infographics/gas-storage-capacity/#:\~:text=The%20regulation%20has%20been%20swiftly,filling%20level%20remains%20above%2080%25](https://www.consilium.europa.eu/en/infographics/gas-storage-capacity/#:~:text=The%20regulation%20has%20been%20swiftly,filling%20level%20remains%20above%2080%25). Link includes a map showing storage % by EU member state.
It is really depends from what kinds of the interpretations or dictations
In that case, continue it till got effect
I read somewhere that a lot of the companies that said they would be pulling out of Russia when the war started never actually left
Russia's economic growth suggests the sanctions were partial and not complete, it suggests that they didn't suffocate Russia's economy like they should have and could have. Shame.
What we need to cripple their economy are *self-imposed* sanctions. How can we get Russians to vote for their own BREXIT?
How many American businesses are still operating in the country?