Uh-OH
Russia’s market-rate GDP in 2021 was US$1.65 trillion, enough to make it the world’s 11th largest economy, behind South Korea. If we crudely convert Russia’s 2021 estimated GDP by March 7, 2022, currency rates, rather than the average exchange rate used last year, and place it against the
2021 market-rate GDP table, the rankings change and
Russia slides to 22nd place, falling between Taiwan and Poland.
This drop is likely an underestimate. While a falling ruble lowers Russia’s exchange rate of its GDP to U. S. dollars, its
weakening economy lowers its ruble GDP directly. And
Russia’s isolation will erode its economic competitiveness, widening the economic gap further in the medium term.
Ukrainians confronted with the oncoming Russian army were wise to Putin’s chimeric strategy. “Don’t you have problems in your country to solve? Are you all rich there, as in the Emirates?” one elderly
man heckled Russian soldiers.
Putin’s next move
Robert F. Kennedy famously observed that GDP failed to account for many things that we care about — like health and education. The fall in Russia’s market-rate GDP cannot begin to describe the human tragedy playing out in both Ukraine and Russia.
But what these figures do make clear is that Putin’s claim to legitimacy through economic performance is all but destroyed. With “great power status” tied closely to economic power, Putin’s back-door source of legitimacy from stirring up nationalist pride now seems closed as well.
"between Taiwan and Poland" Dupa Jasz, Vladimir!
from
Even before Ukraine invasion, Russia's economic capabilities were hardly capable of sustaining an empire
www.business-standard.com
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