[Schiendelman]

I was at a wedding in Yerevan last week and got to talk to a lot of Russians. It's clear the country has collapsed already - it's going to act fine on life support for another five years, but it's already hollow. The best knowledge workers left. The birthrate has fallen through the floor. There's no future.

[drysine]

>got to talk to a lot of Russians. It's clear the country has collapsed already

These are all emigrants, they tell each other (and you) these stories to make themselves feel better.

>The best knowledge workers left.

To Armenia? ))

[Schiendelman]

I get that you're being cute, but please don't think that last note is what I think! :)

Expats are usually right about their home countries - they're the ones with the most data points.

[drysine]

>Expats are usually right about their home countries - they're the ones with the most data points.

How so?

They don't live in the country and don't have a clue about what life is like there now. They read Western media and "opposition" news sites (living off State Department and EU grants) and those sources validate their decision to leave Russia.

There are over million of Ukrainian expats in Russia and the ones I know hate post-2014 Kiev regime with passion. Is that the case where expats are right?

[Schiendelman]

You seem... very biased. :)

[RetroTechie]

Never underestimate the Russian people's ability to suffer.

[Schiendelman]

Oh, I'm not! This is purely a numbers issue.

Sources differ (Rosstat is very very questionable), but consensus is that there were 145 million people in Russia in 2022, and this year there are only 143 million. That trend line is devastating and unrecoverable, especially with the rate of decline increasing.

There are also now 8+ million Ukrainian refugees. I think that's the main reason they invaded, frankly - to move the mostly ethnically Russian population from eastern Ukraine into Russia. If you didn't count them, they'd be well under 140 million.

Russia's trading - they're killing off their prison population and the less talented/connected of their young men, and losing emigrants, and getting Ukrainian refugees. It would have been a good trade for them, if it had actually been a short war. But at this point, it's killed their future.

[drysine]

>Sources differ (Rosstat is very very questionable), but consensus is that there were 145 million people in Russia in 2022, and this year there are only 143 million.

So what is that? Sources differ or there is "consensus"? What are these "sources" and how can they possibly know the size of Russian population?

>That trend line is devastating and unrecoverable, especially with the rate of decline increasing.

So more propaganda promising Russia's collapse/implosion/other_scary_words. There has been a lot of such scaremongering in the last 35 years and today it's just a marker of Western propaganda.

[RetroTechie]

There's census data & trends from pre-war. AIUI there's multiple organisations (besides families) that keep track of people sent to the front, who then went silent (killed, MIA, or even deserted).

Dispute numbers all you want. But the overall trend got bad enough that Russia's government even stopped publishing population figures. Would a normal functioning country do that?

Worse: a big share is people in their 20s or 30s. Many survivors come back with PTSD or handicapped for life. Smart ones have left the country & are building a new life elsewhere. All the funds poured into the war effort are not put into education, IT sector, infrastructure, building houses, science, etc etc.

This is not something any country can recover from quickly. Replenish weapon stocks, sure. But the brain drain, social & economic effects will keep hurting Russia for decades to come.

[Schiendelman]

Just a marker? Dude, you live in Russia, right? Have you lived anywhere else to compare?

[drysine]

Again, you haven't answered any questions.

What are these "sources" you allude to?

How can they possibly know the size of Russian population?