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Not in favor of the poor: Russia's official poverty figures drastically underestimate the actual scale of poverty in the country (theins.press)

submitted 4 days ago by tardigrada@beehaw.org to c/news@beehaw.org

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In the first half of 2024, Russia's federal statistics agency, Rosstat, reported 13.3 million people living in poverty across the country. Although this is an increase from 2023, it drastically underestimates the actual scale of poverty.

For years, the Russian government has manipulated statistics, with Rosstat revising its methods to meet presidential mandates aimed at lowering poverty rates.

However, evaluating current data by using the previous methodology reveals a much grimmer picture: by the end of 2023, the number of poor people in Russia was 1.5 times higher than officially acknowledged — ranging from 14.6 to 18 million (up to 12.5% of the population), according to The Insider. Many of those classified as “not poor” struggle to afford basic necessities like clothing and food. Poverty levels surged after the start of the full-scale invasion of Ukraine, and despite enormous government spending, the situation has yet to return to pre-war levels.

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[–] millie@beehaw.org 1 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago) (1 children)

I get that it's important to document this stuff, but to me this headline basically reads as: "Breaking News! Ocean Extremely Wet! Also Salty!"

[–] HumanPenguin 1 points 3 days ago (1 children)

Yeah.

I would be genuinely interested to know of any nations. That use a truly accurate measure of poverty. Seems all nations are ashamed to have poor, but also wish to do little to help.

For all Russia's faults. It's not really different to the rest of the world.

[–] Quexotic@beehaw.org 2 points 3 days ago

I'm definitely anti-Russia, but this is only useful as propaganda. What would be useful would be a full on meta-analysis of numerous countries' accuracy in poverty measurement vurses actual (or maybe estimated) poverty, alongside a scale of percentage of resources devoted to the remediation of poverty.

I think such an analysis would solidly prove your point.