Is the talking point I’d use if I was in the business of making pro-Russia propaganda.
Poll:
| апр. 92 |
апр. 09 |
май. 11 |
май. 12 |
май. 13 |
май. 14 |
мар. 15 |
май. 15 |
май. 16 |
May 17 |
Sept 19 |
|
| Gathering documents for exit | <1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | <1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | <1 |
| Have taken definite decision to leave | <1 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 1 | 3 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 1 |
| Thinking of leaving | 3 | 3 | 6 | 5 | 5 | 5 | 4 | 4 | 7 | 7 | 6 |
| Something think of leaving | 18 | 19 | 21 | 17 | 17 | 13 | 10 | 16 | 16 | 16 | 16 |
| Never think of leaving | 79 | 78 | 69 | 68 | 73 | 76 | 82 | 76 | 73 | 74 | 78 |
| N/A | – | – | – | 6 | 4 | 3 | 2 | 3 | 2 | – | – |
Of course, a more accurate summary is that there has been no major change in this indicator since records began.
This hasn’t stopped the Western media from weaponizing the latest Levada poll to blare out the onset of the nth wave of Russian youth fleeing from PUTLER.
- RFERL: Number Of Young Russians Who Want To Emigrate Hits Highest Level In Decade
- Moscow Times: Young Russians’ Desire to Leave Hits 10-Year High – Poll
- Bloomberg: Generation Z Wants to Leave Russia in Record Numbers, Poll Shows
… based on a modest uptick in the percentage of 18-24 y/o’s saying they want to emigrate (blue).
But young people everywhere are more energetic and explorative, so to get a better picture of whether Russians truly hate living in their own country you’d have to compare like to like, e.g. all age groups.
The percentage of all Russians wishing to emigrate as of this September 2019 poll is at 21%, which is somewhat higher but broadly in line with the long-term average.
| Certainly yes | Sooner yes | Sooner no | Certainly not | N/A | |
| Sept 19 | 8 | 13 | 20 | 57 | 2 |
| May 19 | 7 | 8 | 20 | 63 | 2 |
| дек.18 | 7 | 10 | 21 | 61 | 3 |
| май.17 | 3 | 12 | 23 | 56 | 7 |
| май.16 | 5 | 14 | 28 | 47 | 6 |
| май.15 | 4 | 12 | 27 | 52 | 5 |
| май.14 | 5 | 12 | 32 | 45 | 7 |
| май.13 | 6 | 16 | 29 | 40 | 9 |
| май.12 | 6 | 14 | 27 | 46 | 8 |
| май.11 | 7 | 15 | 25 | 48 | 5 |
Meanwhile, 20%-21% of EU citizens have wanted to emigrate to another country during the 2010-2017 period – basically the exact same figure as in Russia now.
Please keep off topic posts to the current Open Thread.
If you are new to my work, start here.
Looking at overall shares is pointless. Emigration by and large happens by those under the age of 40 and particularly under the age of 30. Once you hit 40+, the willingness to sacrifice all the social contacts, learning a new language (much harder if you’re 45 than 25) and learning/adapting to a new context becomes far harder.
If you look at the combined 15-39 age share, it is at record highs, tied with 2011. Dmitry makes the point that what prevents large-scale Russian emigration is the difficulty of emigration comparatively speaking to other EE countries. If that would ever change due to unilateral liberalisation on the part of Western Europe towards Russian workers, then Russia would see massive outflows much faster than any Russian nationalist would want to admit to themselves.
AK lives in Moscow, which is a bubble in of itself, he has multiple passports and has passive dollarised income streams via Patreon, a cushy academic job, comes from an academic family with supposed nobility roots and has a bitcoin stash. In other words, he is completely unrepresentative of the average Russian in his socio-economic profile. Russia’s economic stagnation will make emigration more enticing as the 20s roll on and this poll does show that, no matter the spin.
As I point out, the desire to emigrate tends to be higher amongst younger age groups, anywhere. You are taking one poll, and not even comparing like to like with it.
Partly true, partly not. It is amusing what various commenters invent, or in this specific case embellish, about me.
Is that wishful thinking? I am not seeing any signs of economic stagnation with Russia seemingly exporting more grain than it ever has and on the verge to sign contracts to sell coal to the Indians and having contracts to sell gas and oil to China. Their arms exports are also up.
Can you substantiate the claims of economic stagnation?
Прорвало.
You’re right about old people tending not to emigrate, but otherwise incorrect. As AK noted in the post above, modern young people are simply more inclined to explore than any other generation.
Often when they say they want to leave, it means they want to study or work abroad for a year or two and then return. Alternatively, some will leave with the intention of it being permanent and find the West not to meet their expectations, and then return.
Also your assertion that Russian stagnation will make emigration more enticing is suspect, as the vast majority of the Western world is economically stagnating. Russia has higher economic growth than France, Germany, and Italy. Life in the West is becoming increasingly hard to navigate for anyone other than skilled professionals, and even for them conditions are declining.
I suspect the contrary will happen, and as the 2020s role on, Russians will be ever less interested in leaving as Russian cities improve, quality of life continues to rise, and swpl culture takes root outside of Moscow and St.P – all while the West becomes increasingly unstable and unattractive.
The western European countries may be stagnating, but they are stagnating at much higher levels of economic development. Russia badly needs economic growth, if it wants to hold its ground in front of China, EU and US in the future. If Russia would have had a bigger, richer economy, Ukraine would have been an EAEU member already.
Old people in the US often move to warmer climates, though this is mainly a domestic phenomenon. Expat retirees are marginal for now.
Nostalgia for the Old Country might be one way out of the West’s demographic tailspin. Retirees going back to enjoy a First World pension at Third World cost of living.
The largest “minority” in Mexico is actually dual national retirees.
Emigration rates in V4 countries have declined quite a bit compared to 5-7 years ago, in no small part because rising convergence. Though I am skeptical to how much that convergence can continue (as I’ve outlined in other posts and won’t repeat here). So it is not the case that this is a universal truth even for EE countries. Sweden’s net emigration rate is very low for native Swedes. And even there, many are 2nd gen immigrants going to the “home country” for their retirement but with a Swedish pension. Or Swedish pensioners going to Portugal etc.
There are still multiple pain points for Russians wishing to emigrate. If a number of big Western countries made unilateral visa liberalisation moves towards Russians, it would massively lower the barriers of exit, both in terms of leaving but perhaps even more crucially in terms of staying unless one finds a job right away.
Western stagnation is a fair point, but stagnating at a level where the average nominal wage is ~5X higher (corrected for working hours). This is the central, uncomfortable fact. And I don’t see Russia closing that gap any time soon. In fact, ever. So if that gap stays fairly constant, possibly closing to 4X at best, then the incentive will be there. People overestimate national concerns and underestimate economic ones. The big barriers to large-scale Russian emigration is not national pride but bureaucratic hurdles still in place. If these get lifted, emigration will accelerate substantially.
Russia’s growth has seen recent revisions which are not uncontroversial. The household income has seen declines for five years straight.
https://i.imgur.com/ww7z3XG.jpg
I certainly think that SPB and Moscow will draw in a significant fraction of the Russian elite, but many of would-be emigrants are from lower strata of society, hence my previous comment about AK’s socio-economic profile blinding him. If you’re a bottom-40% income earner, you pay through your nose in rent in Moscow but you don’t earn that well. You are sharing housing estates with lots of central asian moslems, and let’s not forget that HIV/drug issues are still much bigger problems in Russia. Homicide rate is still substantially higher. These metrics look better in Moscow but still worse than they do in Berlin, Munich, Vienna, Stockholm, Copenhagen etc.
Although you are probably correct that if Western Europe had open borders with Russia there would be a large outflow, the implied conclusions are misleading. Russia is a growing country, and it takes a long period of consistent economic development to equal first world countries in all metrics recorded by international agencies, with very few countries successfully doing so. If western Europe had opened its borders to Russia, the country would probably never have developed a sustainable economic model that provides for its citizens, and emigration would have become a self-reinforcing problem, as it has become in the rest of Eastern Europe.
Also, for the record, I’ve met plenty of young people, including many who are quite close to me, who entertain the idea of emigrating, and I live in a country that is supposedly one of the best in the world to live in, so Karlin isn’t completely wrong that youthful restlessness skews the younger group’s responses.
Just a clarification.
This concerns HIV/drug/murder rates, not the demographics of non-European minorities with the possible exceptions of Copenhagen and some Northern European cities like Edinburgh or Helsinki.
The smart fraction which generates much of post-industrial economic growth, is also the most subversive culturally.
Imagine, for whatever reason, that Japanese companies that dominated in hardware, were also able to dominate in software. Silicon Valley would have instead developed somewhere in Japan, and a large Western/Chinese/Indian diaspora would have settled.
This alt-Japan probably would institutionalize multikult, and quite possibly establish English as its second official language. Alt-Japan is considerably wealthier, but also much less stable.
The culture angle is why I’m not as “Yellow Peril” as I used to be. Increasing Chinese investment in Hollywood might well clean up the industry, rather than exporting subversion back home. The American culture industry needs its wings clipped, if the nationalist rights are to succeed both here and abroad.
We are certainly in full agreement here, which is why Russophobia in Western Europe is probably a disguised benefit for Russia in this sense without many of them even being aware of it.
Russia’s economic performance has been pathetic compared to its impressive human capital. That is an inescapable conclusion. I don’t buy the excuses being offered (resource curse, legacy of communism). Deng had a far crazier system to contend with than any of the Russian “reformers” yet he did a fantastic job whereas Russians largely destroyed their own society.
One could argue that the West certainly cheered on this process – and I wouldn’t dispute that it was occuring in quite a few capitals – but I am skeptical that Russia would have acted differently if the roles were reversed. If Russia could have achieved primacy by gutting a main geopolitical rival, it would have done so. Yet it got gutted itself because it was the weaker one and remains so. Such is life. The more interesting question is why is this persistent weakness never going away? Why is Russia incapable of ever rising to the same level as the West?
I’m warming to the idea of the O-ring theory. Small differences throughout a long chain make a very large cumulative impact in the end. There may not need be major differences in human capital for there to be major consequences. Russia also had a fairly well-educated workforce in Soviet times compared to some other EE countries (as can be seen in PIAAC 2013 for the over-55 age group) so they had a fairly high base once the wall fell. That makes the failure of Russian policymakers even more bizarre and puzzling.
All the young, talented people already left. Big whup.
As others pointed out, an aging society has less emigration.
@Thulean Friend
This has always been the big surprise. Russia has everything. More natural resources than any other country, and a lot of people with advanced STEM educations (unlike, say, Brazil).
The underperformance is rather startling. Consider where China was in 1991, and the progress they made in the elapsed time, vs. Russia. Russia ought to have dominated all the industries that China instead now dominates.
Title-page of last saturday’s issue of Germany’s leading tabloid: “We can no longer afford Germany” – “more and more pensioners move to Poland”
https://abload.de/image.php?img=img_20191130_0816331v4ju8.jpg
Russia’s economic performance has been pathetic compared to its impressive human capital.
From reading AK’s blog and the comments, it is clear to me that the Slavs are just a bit off, not quite right in the head, and that explains quite a bit.
Could it be that a certain group that had hoped to decamp to China has been impeding the ability of Russia to expand its exports and was moving much of America’s production to China?
I hear the Learned Elders of Wye have given up on decamping to China.
Rest assured this blog is not entirely representative of any given Slavic nation.
Two flaws in that line of argument :
i) That Jews can always distort and dominate a country, even when they are under 1% of the population.
ii) That Jews were somehow disallowed from going to Hong Kong (which they are not). Most Chinese in HK/China can’t distinguish between a Jew and gentile, particularly if the Jew conceals other stereotypes.
Yes, everything including several very important negative factors that make it much more difficult to develop the country.
http://www.unz.com/akarlin/reconsidering-parshev/
Note how neither 1) nor 3) (and to a lesser degree, 2) apply to (post-)Deng China, the country you are comparing with Russia.
Deng had much less ethnic diversity to wrangle with. He also had the credibility of being a war veteran, which Gorbachev and Yeltsin did not.
Why not Mexico?
1) It is not colder than Sweden, Finland, etc. which are much more prosperous. Plus, don’t you people always crow about how cold weather equates to more productive people?
2) False. It is equidistant from Western Europe, East Asia, and the Middle East. The weighted mean GDP center of the world is very near to central Russia. And how is ‘too big’ (land wise) a disadvantage? That means having a lot of natural resources.
3) Not as many as the US and UK. What percentage of the World’s GDP was unwilling to trade with Russia circa 2000?
4) Again, China had to undo a far crazier system and start from a much more dire level of poverty, as others have pointed out.
None of your points hold up.
Russia relative to Europe now is probably much like Hungary was relative to Europe on the eve of EU accession – 4x wage differential, low foreign language proficiency, not much of a diaspora community (unlike, say, the Poles). So I expect its emigration profile would likewise approximate Hungary’s, as opposed to either Poland’s then, or the Ukraine’s today… in the magical scenario that the EU institutes open borders and free labor markets with Russia right this instance.
Russia in the past 5 years has undergone a period of fiscal and monetary tightening, i.e. exchanging the political capital from Crimea to build up immunity to sanctions. So economic performance over the past 5 years, during which is has indeed underperformed the V4, is not indicative of future prospects.
Hi Thulean friend
Thanks a lot for the informed commentry. Really I despair when I have to read Karpins nonsense time and again on Unz. All these faux and ultimately meaningless statistics which he carefully selects and then selectively reads to make preconceived points. I believe readers of Unz are anyhow already way beyond believing the anti Russian drivel that the mass media shower us with. No need to paint Russia and her situation in better colours than she deserves. Fact of the matter is that Putin did indeed do a lot of good and things are incomparably better than in the Nineties. But now the regime has ossified and there is a lot of bad things going on. Especially if you are young and ambitious and not of either a good family or with Western contacts (like Karlin) things are getting worse.
I had a long and frank talk with a lawyer in St.Petersburg. He is a Russian patriot (maybe he shouldn´t tell these things to a foreigner he said to me) and from a “good” that is KGB family. His father served with Putin in East Germany so there is nothing to fear for him personally. He told me that the criminal police and the tax authorities are running absolutely wild. He says it is like a new 37. Surely some hyperbole but what is happening is that small entrepeneurs (of course not Oligarchs with Kremlin connections) are accused of some arbitrary criminal offense and then shaken down. It is a mass phenomenen and in court his clients always win in the end. But things rarely get to court.Most people fold before they get their day in court and simply pay. The reason being that they are put in pre trial detention where conditions are so bad (food, sanitary conditions and medical care) that they rather give up than come back with damaged health.There is no torture but what the authorities do as well is put the most obstinate in a cell with hardened criminals and then promise these criminals a partial pardon if the accused confess to whatever they were accused of.
I don´t know nor think that these things originate with the Kremlin. They are more the result of a certain hyper capitalism that is understood as making money by any means possible.
If you further consider the abysmal pay in Universities (no tenure on top) and the fact that these small companies that are being if not destroyed than severely hampered were an important outlet for young gifted Russians you understand why lot´s of young Russian would immediately leave when given the chance. The good thing for Russia though is that there are not given the chance. It is anything but easy to gain a foothold in the West. Crazy but true it is easier to claim asylum in Europe for any iliterate Arab than it is to gain a work visa for a highly qualified Russian.
SO THANKS AGAIN THULEAN FRIEND.
Russia’s still relatively high (but rapidly falling) murder rates are the result of people knifing each other to death in zapois, not street banditry.
Those sorts of degenerates are, unfortunately, the least likely to emigrate. But happily they are not much of a public menace these days.
Keeping away from those degenerates, and functionally, Moscow is probably safer than most major West European cities.
http://www.unz.com/akarlin/moscow-worlds-safest-megacity-for-women/
https://twitter.com/akarlin88/status/1171877275844960261
While there are still many areas in which it would make sense for young professionals to move from Russia or even Moscow to certain Western technopolises, things like crime or AIDS certainly aren’t one of them.
It’s called the advantage of backwardness. That’s a good thing (in terms of growth).
Indeed. I am slightly mystified why some hope for a rapprochement between Russia and Western Europe. We are very fortunate that Vladimir Putin did not get his desired outcome wrt Western EU; that particular victory would probably have defeated Russia.
Russia is the 6th largest economy in the world, and they have maintained this status despite the total collapse in the 90s; frankly, no one would have seen their recent return to normality coming at the time, only with the most contorted possible standards can this accomplishment be construed as “Pathetic”. Even by nominal measures, they had grown from being the 18th largest economy in the world in 1995, to the 9th largest in 2015.
One obvious difference between the modern trajectory of China and Russia is that in China the state did not implode. The Soviet Union was disassembled by gangsters in suits who proceeded to cannibalize the country and sell off as much of it as they could to their foreign partners. (((Some))) Westerners did not only cheer on this process, they actively played a role in engineering it, and they now continue their work in the west by loudly bleating about Putin’s supposed authoritarianism, Bill Browder being a fine example of such individuals.
You have a very short historical memory. Until recently, the west was not on the same level as the west, and Russia was not on the same level as it currently is. For much of the early part of their known history, these lands were primarily known for being frigid wilderness that provided a source of slaves for Romans, Greeks, Arabs, Turks and Mongols, until they finally overpowered their tormentors around the 4th century (greeks+ romans) and the early modern period (arabs +turks/mongols). In the case of Russia, they continued to deal with this plague for a much longer time, owing to geographic proximity to the Ottoman empire and the Tatars’ base in the Steppes. They only overcame this threat by completely overrunning these enemies.
If anything, taking a vast overview of Russian history shows that the Russian people have gone remarkably far in building their civilization, with few others coming close to their level of growth. Estimates are that around the Birth of Christ, there were fewer than 4 million people in the territory of the FSU. Meanwhile, there were apparently over 27 million in Western Europe, just over 4 million in the rest of Eastern Europe, 60 million in China, and 75 million in India. In the succeeding 2000 years, the FSU territories exhibited by far the greatest population expansion in all th old world, relative to their starting population, with the Russians forming a unified state and expanding across the North asian plateau.
It is waste of time to argue with someone who does not get that more land means more costly infrastructure to develop which makes development more difficult and less efficient than it could be.
Shows how much you know. Most of Russia is much colder than Sweden’s population centers.
Per Capita, but they aren’t going to become Geopolitical heavyweights any time soon
The US and UKs enemies were much weaker
The US is a superpower and the UK was a superpower, both of them were Russia’s enemies, and both of them worked to sow divisions within Russia (British agents helped start the tradition of Chechen terrorism during the 1800s)
This is a monumental challenge to a nation which already has the longest frontier with the Islamic world, an extremely exposed geography and a poorer population then it’s superpower rivals
China in the 90s had a clean slate Governed by the CCP, while Russia had competing sects of leeching Oligarchs, ex-Communists, deranged liberals and KGB colonels
China also had the benefit of the US moving all of their industry to the mainland, for some idiotic reason
Oh yeah, and Russia in the 90s had just gone through a collapse, losing 20% of it’s territory (300 years of Geopolitical gains) and a large chunk of it’s population
The 90s for Russia were Weimar style anarchy, while China had it’s first boom years
Not by some utterly huge amount, plus you omitted Finland. Fail.
I could throw in Estonia into the mix as well, as they are doing quite well and have the same weather as Russia’s population centers.
Somalia is also fairly homogenous. Sure, there are clans but clans exist in China, too. The issue isn’t how homogenous a country is, but how capable its leadership class are, and of course the base foundation of its people. A thin layer of highly competent elites cannot do much with a 3rd world population, as the largely white and asian business class in South Africa painfully demonstrates, or whatever is left of them after all the BEE nonsense.
Why would you compare the West with Mexico? Its human capital profile resembles a typical Latin American country, so it is not surprising to find it performing as one. Russia’s nominal per capita income is in the same vicinity as Mexico despite having a human capital at – or above – Spain and Italy. Russia should do many times better than Mexico, instead it is barely above it.
Translation : Your point was exposed as extremely weak, and you are butthurt.
More land = more natural resources. There are countless sources that indicate this as an advantage that is very desirable. To claim that a huge land is a negative is extremely ignorant.
Plus, China is somewhat smaller than Russia, but it is not THAT small.
Your arguments are identical to those used by Africans to make excuses for why SS-Africa is a basket case.
Dang, makes me want to take my SS check and move to Mother Russia.
Wait, can I get good Mexican food (American style) in Russia?
No, he is absolutely correct. Russia is the second coldest country in the world apart from Mongolia with its 3M people.
Estonia and Finland =~ Saint-Petersburg, which is well above the Russian average climatically.
There are absolutely no equivalents anywhere else in the world for (relatively) massive cities like Krasnoyarsk, Norilsk, Yakutsk,, etc. where winter temperatures regularly reach -40C. Incidentally, the concentration of such cities in Russia is a consequence of economically illiterate Soviet planning (dictated by Engels’ dictum of spreading out the population equally over the territory) that will continue to impose large costs on Russia until global warming solves that problem.
China has 10x the population.
I have a theory that a lot of Russia’s economic growth is masked due to it playing catch up. New bridges are not as noticeable as as new unicorn software companies pooping out products that will go bankrupt in five years.
The Nordic countries and the Baltic states alike are all warmer than most of Russia, Finland being the exception, not the rule. Even Tallinn has somewhat warmer winters than St. Petersburg, despite their proximity.
Finland was ruled by foreign kingdoms and empires for most of its history, one of those empires being Russia, as were the Baltic States. They are hardly an example of Russian inferiority.
There is also geography. Poles in Germany can take a train or drive home on long weekends, someone from Novosibirsk who moved to Germany will be much more isolated from his homeland.
Moscow is as rich as any Western country; young mobile Russian people don’t have to move to the Eastern EU since they have Moscow right in their own country.
This is the Russian talking point I am somewhat sympathetic to. Basically, “you developed because we were the shock absorbers of the non-white riffraff”. Balkans also say this regarding the Ottoman Empire and its deleterious effects. I find both arguments to have some merit, particularly for the Balkans.
However, this argument comes under strain in Russia’s case after 1700 AD, when it was constantly expanding and rising. The Ottomans were on the wane, and in their latter years artifically kept afloat by Western powers for fear of what might come if they implode. Nobody had to worry about Mongol invasions anymore and the huns were a historical curiosity. Russia had an impressive series of great rulers and reformers and rapidly started to expand and dominate over countries that had previously looked down upon it. Persia was just one example. In fact, many of the Persian reformers in the 19th century were obsessed with how Russia could beat them so handidly and this sparked internal debate to a great extent. Yet something happened and Russia’s converge stalled with the West. It still rose in absolute terms but never managed to get very
True, but this bolsters my argument rather than undermines it. Why does China have significantly more capable elites?
This is a fair point, Russia has done fairly well demographically over the long time period. But that exceptionalism doesn’t appear to be present anymore, or really in the last century. Might this change? AK’s work on “breeders” is certainly intriguing.
A while ago there was a story about an American official who got blasted and tried to play with a band covering Beatles songs in a Mexican restaurant in Moscow, so…. maybe.
You can buy ingredients and make it yourself, if not.
Gross nominal wages are what.. $1350? Around 1/3rd of what you get in most Western capitals. And Russian income inequality is also substantially higher, meaning that the difference with the Western (particularly more egalitarian Scandinavian) median wages are even greater, and it is the latter that is more relevant for the most emigration-likely demographic.
Either way, I don’t doubt that Moscow will act as a sponge for the Russian elite. I conceded as much. But Moscow cannot house tens of millions of Russians belonging to the lower-middle class and working class. They have to make do outside that city and SPB. Life in milioniki is probably not terrible by any stretch. But it is a far cry from what you can get in Copenhagen, Stockholm, Munich, Zurch, Vienna, Amsterdam etc and I don’t think that will change any time soon. Luckily for Russia, neither will visa liberalisation.
Well Edmonton’s mean temperature in January is only 9 degrees warmer than that of Krasnoyarsk, and much colder than Moscow, Nizhni, and much of the rest of European Russia where most Russians live. Both cities have about the same population.
Moscow isn’t great for Mex/Tex-Mex, though I can’t say much since I’m not a big fan of that cuisine. That said, the cheap, kitschy-American Starlite Diner has plenty of Mexican and Tex-Mex dishes, and I also enjoyed the Casa Agave the one time I was there; there are about a dozen other Mexican restaurants in Moscow. And plenty of American places like aforementioned Starlite Diner, and the Duckstars chain, have Mex/Tex-Mex food as well.
El Copitas in Saint-Petersburg was voted as one of the Top 50 bars in the world.
There’s a few major factors that multiply the effective worth of Russian wages:
(1) The PPP adjustment. (Yes, “poor man’s GDP”, whatever – but paying $12 for 200 Mbps Internet + unlimited data phone plan is good for anyone).
(2) Relatively low taxes and utility costs.
(3) “Gray” salaries – there’s some nice sides to corruption.
On average, though, Russia is still colder.
Average “temperature per capita” in:
Russia: -12.5C
Canada: -9.0C
USA in 1930: 1C
“The Siberian Curse” by Gaddy and Hill develops these arguments and has lots of other statistics showing that Russia is quite exceptional in this department.
The population distribution of Russia is in the relatively warmer parts of the country. Very few people live in Siberia :
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/7/7c/Population_Density_as_of_2017.png/396px-Population_Density_as_of_2017.png
The notion that the ‘country is too cold’ as a reason for its economic underperformance does not hold up (plus does not affect the fact that the country has vast mineral resources, vast area for wind power, etc.). Few countries have as high a level of natural resources per capita as Russia, and even fewer when you consider the diversity of natural resources (i.e. not just oil and gas).
I realize that Soviet central planning is the reason some people got stuck in Yakutsk, Verkhoyansk, etc. But still, the pop density map reveals that they are not a large percentage of the people.
The Industrial Revolution happened.
https://bautechnikgeschichte.files.wordpress.com/2015/07/lorenz.pdf
So? We are talking about per capita prosperity.
Other clods on this thread say that the much smaller population of Finland is an advantage relative to Russia. It seems that either way, Russia’s population is ‘wrong’, and it can’t win. The population is too high to be prosperous per capita, but also too low to be prosperous per capita.
Plus, having ‘too much land’ (i.e. too many natural resources) is somehow a negative, but somehow that is not the case for Canada. The ‘natural resource curse’ has already been debunked in Russia’s case.
The real answer : There is just too much innate corruption in the country, and too much of a brain drain that has already happened via emigration. When a Russia comes to the West, they are surprised that the President or Prime Minister does not automatically become the richest person in the country.
In terms of of per capita GRP PPP Moscow is at $74,000:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_federal_subjects_of_Russia_by_GDP_per_capita
About tied with Norway as second highest in Europe (Ireland is #1).
Of course a lot of this is stuff that regular people do not see.
In terms of average wages my statement was an exaggeration.
https://www.rbth.com/business/330451-average-salary
Russia’s (and Ukraine’s) wages in dollars are undervalued due to the currency collapse in 2014-2015. PPP doesn’t affect buying foreign cars or iphones but it makes a difference with respect to food, clothing, utilities, and services.
There are other quirks. Remember than in c. 1990 Russians all got free privatized apartments. So a lot less wages or going to pay for mortgages or rent in society.
So overall I’d estimate real monthly wages for Muscovites of around $2000-$2500. That’s a lot lower than Scandinavia but higher then Portugal, Visegrad and Greece. It’s comparable to Spain.
Yeah, relatively
It’s still cold as hell in Novosibirsk, 3rd largest city in the country
There are these little things called red October, WW1, and WW2, I think you should look up on them.
My point was not to argue for pity for poor easterners, I was simply pointing out the fact that Russia faced the threat of invasion by turks for a much longer time period than the west faced the same threat from arabs, and had a much more arduous task in ending the threat they posed. Part of the reason for their expansion was precisely to end that threat. Russia actually had to deal with raiders from central asia into the 19th century.
After their triumph in the Great northern war, Russia did indeed continuously expand, and their growth in power corresponded with a growth in their population and economic size. Karlin has argued that on the eve of WW1, Russia had made massive strides and was close to rivaling the west in all spheres. Certainly, their cultural accomplishments during this period were hardly minor, and they contributed greatly to the body of world literature in the 19th century.
Today or historically? You were claiming earlier that Russia was chronically inferior to the west and China throughout its history, and I’m unsure if you are referring to China’s elite today or historically.
If you are talking about the past, you are referring to a very long stretch of time, and any generalization over such a period is questionable. Unz and Godfree Roberts have both suggested that China has developed a very longstanding tradition, almost unique amongst nations, of strict hierarchy in authority and similarly strict meritocracy. They are very persuasive, and I am not as familiar with the subject of Chinese history as they are, so I’ll defer to them in this case.
In any case, you were responding here to my comment about the collapse of the USSR. Without oversimplifying things, the USSR was itself formed in decidedly different circumstances than the PRC. The country was led by ethnic minorities at its inception, who did not view the takeover of Russia as the ultimate goal, but merely a means to the conquest of western Europe. They subsequently divided the country into a dozen ethnic republics, with Russians marginalized. The ethnicization of Soviet politics also opened the door to the formation of family clans and patronage, which in turn resulted in the formation of the ethnic mafias and corrupt politicos who later took over the country (again). In short, Russia was more ethnically diverse than China, and the Soviet government, being populated by those ethnics, worsened this issue in many ways.
Throughout its history, the Soviet government was fearful of nationalism. This created longstanding craters in Russian society that were taken advantage of by the opportunistic criminals in the Soviet government, who had never been fully eradicated. The well was poisoned at the beginning of the USSR’s history, and this was never fully forgotten.
China certainly had its own grievous trials, and none of this is meant to demean their accomplishments. However, I do believe that these were the reasons that the USSR collapsed, and China did not.
Again, you are viewing this over a very short time period. I think Mao had it right: “It’s too soon to tell”
With the exception of SPB and the Black Sea coast, most of European Russia is way colder than the countries you mentioned.
It would make sense for Russia to gradually “de-populate” the large Siberian cities and only leave enough people in Siberia to extract energy and raw materials. I don’t mean forced de-population but some sort of government planning to encourage people moving from Siberia to western and southern parts of Russia where the climate is better.
I don’t see any strategic or economic reason to maintain these big cities such as Omsk, Novosibirsk, Tyumen and Irkutsk. It would make more sense for Russia to develop regions such as Moscow, St.Petersburg, Krasnodar, Rostov-na-donu, the Northern Caucasus region, Tatarstan, Bashkortostan etc. where the climate is good for economy and agriculture. Leave Siberia mainly for extracting raw materials.
As for the Far East, I think Russia should try to maintain a solid population there and help cities such as Vladivostok and Khabarovsk to grow just to keep China from outright dominating that region. Siberia on the other hand is geographically too far away from Chinese reach.
China GDP per capita is around $8k nominal, Russia – $11k. There is no Chinese superiority in prosperity. China has 400 million very well off people, and a billion poor ones.
China also prints money like crazy. Their credit expansion is out of this world.
Comparing Russian economy to other major economies makes no sense. USA is something like $72 trillion in debt and growing. If Russia printed money like that it would have a bigger nominal economy.
I’m in the States and haven’t been to Russia in 20 years, but I got my Russian passport recently just in case. By the time my kids grow up, US national debt alone will be $50 trillion or more. I dont know who will be paying that, but my spawn will learn Russian in case they will have to go back to St Petersburg to grandpa.
(i) Capital cities, due to the concentration of corporate HQs, will always have inflated GDP which is not necessarily correlated with as high wages. Ireland is an example of this in a macro sense, given that their entire country is a corporate HQ zone. Their gross nominal wages are on par with UK’s but their GDP per capita is much higher. Looking at wages makes more sense.
(ii) PPP = Poor People’s Parity. We’ve been over this before.
(iii) The ‘currency collapse’ happened in many countries. I used to be able to buy a USD for 6.5 SEK, now it is closer to 10 SEK. Same effect with the DKK, NOK, PLN, HUF, CZK etc.
(iv) 1990 was almost 30 years ago. How easy is it for a young Russian in his early 20s who do not know anyone in Moscow but wants to move there today to get access to this cheap housing? Probably not very.
Great if you’re a desendant of people who lived in Moscow, not so great if you’re not. Vast majority of Russians in the lower-middle and working classes belong to the former. Furthermore, this process of cheap housing happened in most EE countries and that hasn’t prevented a huge emigration wave from most of them.
Fair enough.
In nominal gross terms these numbers are silly. Part of the reason why Russia’s household incomes have been so bleak for years is because the black economy has contracted very significantly. Good for the accounts of the state, bad for the pockets of the people (though ultimately good long-term, as a more formal economy is always better).
Either way, the fact that Moscow’s gross nominal wage is about 2X the Russian average wage only bolsters my argument that it is an island in of itself. Stockholm by comparison is at about 30-35% higher wages than the national average. Unless you can think of a plan to house tens of millions of people into the greater Moscow Area, which would push down wages for everyone else anyway, for these people emigration will continue to be financially very lucrative.
According to conventional liberal theory, Mexico should be as prosperous as Spain. If not moreso.
The conventional arguments about “US imperialism in Latin America” don’t apply to Mexico, they jealously guard sovereignty.
US liberals are incapable of condemning Mexican culture or elites. They definitely won’t acknowledge genetic limitations.
They have one door to go down they haven’t used yet, that of a North American Union.
Good luck winning an election on a platform of massive US development subsidies to Mexico, and absolute freedom of movement.
That’s exactly what Gaddy and Hill suggest.
Problem is, this is an undertaking that will take many decades to complete, and cost a lot of money itself. It’s probably more efficient to just wait for AGW to solve this issue.
Ouch.
Sweden’s Norbotten and Lappland are quite similar to Russia. They have a very low population density, are resource rich and the distances are huge. They’re damn cold.They also happen to be some of our richer provinces.
The “big distance” argument is unpursuasive. What matters is population density for the whole country. Russia’s pop density is low but so is Canada’s.
“our” lol
The Swedish North would obviously not be the same as it is if it were not part of Sweden. Sweden, in turn, is merely one province within the much larger economic and political bloc of the west. Even if Sweden were not of a much more hospitable climate than Russia, it would be meaningless to compare the two, as if they existed in a vacuum.
Same goes for Canada. Canada is America’s hat, a vassal state, its economic situation is incomparable to that of Russia. Canada maintains a tiny military, no nuclear arsenal, does not face any real military trials and never has, and the government happily inundates its population with a massive amount of immigration, artificially boosting its economy at the expense of Canadians (also applies to Sweden).
Personally, I don’t see any reason to maintain cities like Moscow, London Miami and Limassol. it would make more sense to invest resources to improve Omsk, Novosibirsk and Krasnoyarsk.
^ This would be a more sympathetic comment.
We have, and as I’ve explained nominal is meaningful for some specific products such as foreign cars and iphones but not for food, services, clothes, utilities, and locally-made things. Your your dismissal of PPP is largely, but admittedly not completely, BS.
Even though Moscow is Russia’s most expensive city it is still cheaper than Western Europe (i.e, loaf of bread in Moscow is about 60 cents versus $2.70 in Copenhagen and $1.10 in Madrid). Here are the prices of Big Macs in 2018:
https://www.businessinsider.com/mcdonalds-big-mac-price-around-the-world-2018-5
$2.29 in Moscow, versus $4.32 in London, $5.37 in Paris and $6.89 in Zurich.
So yes, an average $1,500 official gross wage in Moscow is overall like a much higher wage in London, Paris, Cologne, etc. The lifestyle of a typical Muscovite is materially about the same as that of a typical western European.
Moscow has been gaining millions of people and, as we have seen, it continues to have a very high quality of life.
Which makes them similar to the KMAO in northern West Siberia.
https://img-fotki.yandex.ru/get/101645/30348152.21e/0_91abe_f4c86485_orig
But rich ressource regions like the KMAO are exceptions, not the rule in Russia and Sweden.
And Russia is still colder.
How do you say “Kevin Williamson” in Russian?
A “zapoi”–as mentioned on the topic of Russian knifings–is a “multi-day bender”.
Back in the day, Soviet Man would lead the existence of a functional alcoholic–be a productive, albeit always a bit buzzed or hangover, member of society, and once in 2-3 months disappear for a week due to “food poisoning”, and everyone at work would know what the deal is.
Two days with no alcohol whatsoever tended to give people convulsions and delirium.
It was like that in what is today Russia, Belarus, the Ukraine, Moldova, Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia.
Today, however, this is no longer the norm in Russia and the Ukraine, with drinking down to Brit/German levels, and the Baltics are on a drift to the “Scandinavian solution”–i.e. everyone being antidepressant addicts instead of being alcoholics.
Hence, I assume, Mr. Karlin calling people in zapoi “degenerates”. Because most productive members of society no longer drink like this.
Also there’s ethnicity. Post-shamanic native peoples in Siberia (for example in Tuva region) tend to have super high levels of homicide and alcoholism. People forget that Russia also has “native Americans” all over the place, only they’re “pre-Americans” as in “Siberians”.
Russia’s population centers are not densely populated on a Chinese scale and much manufacturing(particularly electronics, but not exclusively) were already centered in East Asia long before China opened up. Also, geography is important here. Both external trade and internal development depend upon transport, particularly navigable waterways(river and ocean) where you can easily send things from one place to another. Russia is not actually in a good position in this respect and it takes a bit more work to actually move things.
I agree that Russia has so far underperformed relative to its human capital, but the idea that it could become a manufacturing powerhouse comparable to China makes no sense. It has neither the population density, the location, climate, or the geography to support this.
The bottom line is that Russia must grow at 5 percent per year instead of 1 to 2 percent per year to avoid having it’s per capita GDP be overtaken by China, China’s per capita GDP is already at more 9000 USD, vs. more than 10000 USD for Russia, and China’s per capita GDP will overtake Russia’s in a few years unless Russia can shift its economic growth rate to a consistenly higher rate of around 5 percent.
Does anyone know what accounts for Russia’s relatively poor economic performance?
Pretty loaded question, like Europe or America are doing any better.
I’ve recently met a few young Russian Au Pairs who said they enjoyed their time in the West, but had no interest in ultimately emigrating to the West. A couple had no interest whatsoever in going to the US. Maybe they can fill the gap left by the Young Pioneers with Putin Patriots.
‘Underperformance’ by which metric?
Integrating with the rest of the world, ‘free trade’ or something utterly ridiculous like ‘GDP’ was never (and will not be) important either for Russian leadership or the Russian people.
Utter bullshit. Russian northern cities existed since forever, even before the existence of Russia as a centralized geopolitical entity.
https://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D0%9C%D0%B0%D0%BD%D0%B3%D0%B0%D0%B7%D0%B5%D1%8F
https://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D0%A7%D0%B5%D1%80%D0%B4%D1%8B%D0%BD%D1%8C
https://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D0%9A%D0%B8%D1%80%D0%BE%D0%B2_(%D0%9A%D0%B8%D1%80%D0%BE%D0%B2%D1%81%D0%BA%D0%B0%D1%8F_%D0%BE%D0%B1%D0%BB%D0%B0%D1%81%D1%82%D1%8C)
https://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D0%A1%D0%BE%D0%BB%D0%B8%D0%BA%D0%B0%D0%BC%D1%81%D0%BA
If anything, Russian cities were moved significantly south during Soviet rule.
Also, look at a map: in any possible timeline there would be a city where Krasnoyarsk or Yakutsk are located, simply due to geography.
It is pointless to argue with someone who doesn’t know basic facts.
Permafrost or tundra covers 2/3 of Russian lands. And most of the remaining area has far severe weather than average weather among main population centers in Sweden.
Daily mean temperature in Celsius during January
Stockholm -1.6
comparable cities in Russia
Novosibirsk -16.5, coldest -46
Krasnoyarsk -15.5, coldest -53
Even Moscow has more severe weather than Stockholm with daily mean in January -6.5
Even southern city like Rostov-on-Don -2.9
Among developed countries only Canada and Alaska have comparable weather. In Canada overwhelming majority of people live in the South, where weather is more favorable. Only few people live in Alaska or Norther Canada. In fact Yakutsk alone, where average high in January is around -35.7 in January, has more people than Northern Canada. Compare with Ancourage with similar population where average high in January is -4.9
I was astonished to learn that Vladivostok, which is almost on the same latitude as Turkey or Barcelona, has daily mean in January -12.3
Would your lawyer friend happen to be … Jewish?
Serious question: How corrupt are officials and government in Russia these days?
It’s pretty clear by now that Russia was plundered by you-know-who and (((Harvard))). Though the ethnicity of the ‘oligarchs’ was not discussed at the time.
21% wanting to emigrate abroad still sounds high by Western standards, and when you consider that most of those are likely under 40 that sounds like a huge chunk of the younger population want to emigrate. Although those percentages are probably no higher than most of the Eastern EU states.
I couldn’t find any stats on the percentage of British people who want to emigrate, all stats I could find pertain to attitudes on immigration not emigration. I imagine that’s because the emigration rate of British people is probably negligible, especially when you consider that a significant percentage of British emigrants are retirees going to live in places like Spain, etc, which is a different thing entirely.
Only by non-European Western standards.
https://twitter.com/27khv/status/1199274343806701569
As for where Brits move
https://www.skyscrapercity.com/showpost.php?p=164583600&postcount=44879
No he isn´t Jewish. In fact I contacted him in a matter of genealogical research and the talk about the entrepeneurs was entirely coincidental. On his fathers side he is a descendant of Kulaks (rich farmers) who fled to Leningrad when collectivisation started. On his mother´s side he is descendant from Germans. And yes, the oligarchs are almost all Jewish. But the majority of small entrepeneurs aren´t. It is the tragedy of today´s Russia that these entrepreneurs are being strangled. Apart from the genealogical research my reason for visiting Petersburg was contacting a factory making collapsible boats. If this factory was in Germany they would be world leaders. In Russia they are afraid to grow to much to stay under the radar of the authorities. Very sad indeed.
I am sorry Karlin but really you don´t know your facts. Krasnoyarsk wasn´t the result of Soviet economic planning. It was the result of the Czars building the Transsib. Otherwise – as before- it would be Yenniseysk. By the way: due to the biggest cluster of Hydropower in the world Krasnoyarsk is the center of a huge complex of metal refining. That is why it is such a big and rich city. Norilsk is located on top of one of the biggest (or even the biggest) Nickel deposits in the world. That is why Norilsk is located where it is. And not because of some stupid Soviet decision. And all these places are net contributors to the central budget… Siberia is financing Moscow and has been doing so for several centuries.
As to “absolutely no equivalent in the world”: Edmonton and Calgary in Canada are in January on average just 5 degrees warmer than Krasnoyarsk. Both cities are about the same size as Krasnoyarsk. Both exist for exactly the same reasons like Krasnoyarsk: ressource extraction. Winnipeg, Manitoba is exactly half as big as Krasnoyarsk and even colder in January. By the way: I was born in Novosibirsk and am sorry to say but your ignorance seems to me typical of Muscovites
Pizza followed by Vodka !
https://youtu.be/C9lvzzH0STw
https://youtu.be/xMThTEA4M0o
Thank god for Vladimir Putin !!!
Don’t disagree with the bulk of your comment, but I assume he meant not Krasnoyarsk’s existence but it’s status as a large populated city.
I won’t delve into stats of Russia, just say what I’ve noticed about “economic emigration” from Croatia in past few years. It was big, but it slows down & I’ve seen many of them return.
of course, this is just my observation: it’s less than 50% who were in real need of moving on. I would say that even 2/3 didn’t need to move their asses. Many have returned, c. 50% of all MDs.
this is like lemmings. There is no planning or real assessment, just a herd mentality; when a herd goes, so do its members. It’s as simple as that.
all talk about exploring venues of …is rubbish. Most local “migrants” are just fine examples of slave mentality. For instance, in Ireland, various computer programmers get more money, but after they pay all the stuff- they’re left with even less money, let alone life: they have nothing of life- neither fornication nor family, nothing. They are treated as slaves- but they don’t complain there. Here, with 30% of “uneasiness”, they would noisily protest. There, they are obedient slaves.
My conclusion is: most white peoples, now, are anational & don’t amount to much. True, some of them have life in them, but the majority is easy-to-manipulate automata. Uniform, obedient, non-individualistic, egoist (without real individuality), conformist, …
So- the only force that keeps white people (individuals) from leading pointless lives of rootless cosmopolitans is nationalism (religion is mostly a spent force). As for Asians I don’t know, while darker hues I don’t care for.
How about the simple fact that Russia’s per capita GDP will fall behind China’s in a few years unless the Kremlin can shift the GDP growth curve from 1 to 2 percent to 5 to 6 percent, I mean back in 1990, Russia’s GDP was at 3500 USD per capita vs 318 USD for China, and now is it nearly even, simply put, it is unnaceptable that Russia’s economy is only growing at 1 to 2 percent per year, and no matter how you cut it, Russia is at great risk of falling behind in terms of economic productivity or standard of living.
In Orwell “1984”, statements of this kind are called duckspeaks.
Neither the Russian people nor the Russian people give a shit about ‘GDP’. Sorry to burst your bubble.
(Not good or bad, it’s just how it is.)
The Russian view of ‘standards of living’ is very different from yours. The Russian standard, for example, has ‘national security’ way up there on the top of the list, and ‘iphones and fancy pants n sheet’ way down.
Xi Jinping clearly does, unless you are arguing the only reason he is buying GDP as an important KRA indicator for China, down to very precise growth targets, is because he is a Jewish puppet homo faggot? And GDP per capita is a basically your productivity per capita, which is an important measure of economic advancement and standard of living.
Temperature per capita fell by more than a degree between the beginning and the end of the USSR, while increasing by more than a degree in Canada.
But do continue being wrong.
That is how I understood him. He seems to believe that Krasnoyarsk has a million inhabitants bevause of some Soviet decision.And there are other things that Karlin doens´t seem to be able to get his mind around to. The fact that average temperature is only only onefactor in determining the viabilty for human habitation. More important in fact is the length of growing season, followed by the soil. Western Siberia (and pockets of Krasnoyarski krai including the area around Krasnoyarsk) has (and always had) a grain surplus as it is a black earth region and the growing season is long enough. The summers are hot and they grow water melons wayup north. Maybe small but very sweet.
I know and like Krasnoyarsk although you shouldn´t if you are from Novosibirsk.
Very much so. The situation at the lower levels has improved, but is probably as bad as it ever was at the higher levels. There are also major regional differences (worse in the south, better in the north).
If I was in the business of pro-Russian propaganda, this would be my headline:
No country for young women: 40% of American women younger than 30 would like to emigrate.
https://news.gallup.com/poll/245789/record-numbers-americans-leave.aspx
How well do Russian buses, trucks, or tractors sell outside Russia and Belarus? I mean if you have been to the Philippines, Chinese trucks and buses have almost completely replaced the previous dominance of Japanese manufacturers like Hino and Nissan Diesel. Does Russia have a comparable bus or truck brand with similar export success like China’s Higer, Yutong, or Sinotruck?
Mexican food is rubbish.
Often ignored is Britain’s enormous advantage in transportation costs during the industrial revolutions, British goods were very cheap as they could be shipped and then there was an enormous network of rail and canal links to ship raw materials and finished goods onwards. Russia’s biggest issue is that there was no transport network except for a few rivers, instead bast expanse of nothing, the arrival of the rail network saw Russian industry take off.
Russia’s biggest issue is the Communist ruled for eighty years, not just forty. Otherwise Russia is wealthier than the stats show.
You don’t need a ton of people for any of that. Canada produces same order of magnitude natural resources as Russia with less than a tenth as many people in climatically equivalent regions.
About net financing – you are simply wrong.
https://www.eastrussia.ru/upload/blogs/tab1.jpg
The Far East is 2x as dependent on federal subsidies as Russia on average, regions exceptionally rich in mineral resources (e.g. Sakhalin) aside.
In fact, per capita, some regions like Chukotka gets something like 5x as much federal subsidies as the DICh parasites.
I am not a fan either, but I answered the question.
GBPRUB was 50 when I lived in Russia, it is 83 now.
You know that cities like Magadan, Anadyr, and Yakutsk are actually seeing population increases for the past 10 years right? And looking at Google there are actually a lot of great new hotels in Anadyr, Magadan, and Yakutsk, which is a good indicator of economic growth.
Using China’s economic growth as a stick to beat Russia with is really quite distasteful. The expression used by Xi and other Chinese officials is to describe the relationship as a Comprehensive Strategic Partnership between Russia and China. What is good for one is good for the other, especially in an economic sense. China can truly be a driver for Russian economic growth and vice versa. There is immense good will towards Russia from all strata of Chinese society from the Standing Committee to the common man. They understand that they both face common obstacles and challenges.
I mean what can Russia do so its per capita GDP will not be overtaken by China’s, as what happened to Mexico’s per capita GDP, only that Russia’s IQ level is actually comparable to the US, as opposed to Mexico’s.
Even Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky and Norilsk, has seen population growth recently.
Having lived in both China and Russia, Russians have a much higher standard of living. China still has a long way to go. Your average Chinaman still has a bike, lives in a poorly constructed tiny apartment with no sound proofing, has horrible working conditions, breathes polluted air all with no social welfare net.
Beware the wreckers. SinoRusso friendship forever !!!
https://chinainthecoldwar.weebly.com/uploads/1/4/2/9/14296024/1331824.jpg?359
Using Russia’s economic growth as a stick to beat China with is really quite distasteful. The expression used by Putin and other Russian officials is to describe the relationship as a союзник between Russia and China. What is good for one is good for the other, especially in an economic sense. Russia can truly be a driver for Chinese economic growth and vice versa. There is immense good will towards China from all strata of Russian society from the Duma to the common man. They understand that they both face common obstacles and challenges.
Not everything is measured by money.
My blog friend recently wrote about wild dogs barking and charging at her in the streets of her home Voronezh. Non-fancy parts of Moscow have the same problem. It puts Russia on the level of India, Thailand, and Balkan backwaters. And it can’t be solved because loud busybodies with misplaced mothering instincts (known as зоошиза) have taken over. Here’s Voronezh VK group post where those ladies report on their “activism” (putting tags on dogs without taking them off the streets or somehow curbing their aggression) and are trashed by the locals in replies: https://vk.com/wall-35824409_429527
Another degrading everyday experience is huge puddles that linger after rainfalls and when snow melts. You have to either walk in disgusting muddy water, climb on snow piles on the side to get around it, or jump over (too bad if you’re old, sick, or have small kids with you). I faced it regularly in old Khamovniki with its antiquated sewage, but also in modern Yugo-Zapadnaya. The Toronto area has similar patterns of snowfalls and melting, but puddles here somehow disappear very soon. This Twitter is anti-Sobyanin but it doesn’t matter, the puddles were there before him – that’s just for recent (2018) illustration.
https://twitter.com/simonovkvramble/status/1070711925074550784?s=20
I felt happy in Moscow, I have family and wealth back there, but I don’t think I want those experiences again in my life. Of for that matter, people whose mode of communication is yelling and русский мат. Canadians are nice to each other, and it’s a good thing that you really get used to.
Your average Chinaman is far less likely to get stabbed by a vibrant that they haven’t collected from all over the Third World. So at least they have that going for them.
Whether Yakutsk needs to be keep going with subsidies is not just an internal RF matter. I would appreciate you not screwing up my Risk game by doing away with cities and political entities.
You know that if push comes to shove, then Constantinople is still culturally closer to Paris then Peking right? I mean how is Confucianism related Aristotelian philosophy and neoPlatonism?
Why are you people seemingly intent on Russia becoming a mining colony/natural resource appendage and tourist trap for Chinese?
Why are you people seemingly intent on Russia becoming a mining colony/natural resource appendage and tourist trap for the West.
It’s called doing business. Australia a Western Country has done very well at it and is never described as such !
I hope you know that geographically Siberia and the Far East aren´t equivalent. You are citing almost exclusively subejcts of the federation that aren´t Siberian. YOu are comparing apples with pairs.
As to “equivalent” regions: Saskatshewan, Manitoba and Alberta would be equivalent to Siberia in terms of climate, land use and ressource extraction.
Well according to Wikipedia the three provinces together had about 7 million inhabitants. Siberia without the Far east is about 24 Million but much, much bigger. Even if you include the Far East you get no more than 30 Million. I am amazed how little you know your own country. But then you are a Muscovite and like Thulefriend very truly said: Moscow is another planet. I just wish you wouldn´t just make up things as you go along.
I think it’s propaganda. Where I live (Zelenogorsk near St. Petersburg) snow is cleaned better than in Finland. But Moscow has a lot more money than St. Petersburg. Also about the level of India – this is not an exaggeration but just nonsense.
Usually, nominal is a more meaningful figure – i.e. for most comparison purposes.
PPP is more useful if you look at things like rent, transport or basic food prices. The proportion of your income this constitutes, depends on how poor you are.
However, I am sceptical food prices are accurately compared by PPP.
For example, there exist supermarkets in UK, where food prices are not much different as supermarkets in Russia. However, a large proportion of English people choose to go to much more expensive supermarkets.
Here it is a voluntary choice of the English population, to go to expensive supermarkets. But PPP will compare the average prices, rather than the possible ones.
A large proportion of English people are rich enough that they specifically choose to buy food in luxury supermarkets like Tesco, Waitrose, M&S – where prices can be multiple times higher.
If you are comparing prices of same products across different countries (e.g. price of nescafe, or price of Actimel, or price of Pringles) that will be accurate comparison – but the base prices are the same in Russia and Europe, the difference is just how much the supermarket adds to the price for profit.
But if you are just comparing something like “chocolate” – then it could be a comparison of Lindt in the “status conscious” English supermarket, with Milka or Alpen gold in the Russian supermarket.
MacDonald’s are experts at changing the price to match what the population can afford in different countries, which they achieve by brutal exploitation of local workers.
For example, MacDonald’s in Australia pays $18 an hour for the same job, that McDonald’s in Russia pays $1,90 an hour
So apparently 9,5 MacDonald’s employees in Russia are equivalent cost to 1 MacDonald’s employee in Australia.
Big Mac index is mainly tracking a difference in labour costs (MacDonald’s achieves different prices by brutally exploits its local workers in countries where this is allowed).
This comparison is nonsense.. It could be a comparison of a real bakery bread, from a shop where they mixed the flour and put it in their family bread oven (if you are lucky in Spain, you might enter a bakery cooking the highest standard bread made anywhere in the world), with typical preprepared bread dough which is difficult to escape in Russia, including in some bakeries which you can see only have reheating ovens.
In Spain you can also buy 60 cent bread in a supermarket, but this is preprepared bread dough which they just heat up, using the same methodology in Russian supermarkets and even a lot of bakeries. You can also find this same fake reheated bread dough in some bakeries in Spain. (For example, in Bertiz bakery chain, you can see they iuse reheated dough)
However, you might also luckily walk into a authentic family bakery of Spanish towns – and they might sell you the most delicious fresh bread you have ever tasted for €1.30.
And which Western Europe? In a Spanish supermarket, a can of beer can be €0.40. And in an English supermarket, you might only find £2.50 as the cheapest single bottle of beer.
What people whine about in Moscow these days: Bus parades and some gay puddles or whatever.
https://twitter.com/akarlin88/status/1173009932305784834
Just a testament to how far it has come.
Very bizarre argument. Of course they are our provinces. We developed them, without any outside help. You seem to subscribe to somekind of invisible helping hand theory. Italy has been part of the core Western canon/civilisation for much longer than Sweden yet today is signicantly poorer. They had a much stronger lead start. Scandinavia didn’t develop until quite late.
There is no iron law here, no inevitability. You seem to take past events for granted. The terrain that Sweden is on isn’t the best one to put it mildly. Norway if anything had even worse conditions. By the time they had found their oil in the 1960s, they were already a very rich country (something many people do not understand/know). Norway was in fact already the richest Scandinavian state by 1960 according to Maddison database. Oil does not explain their success, for they achieved it far earlier and kept it. Oil simply acted as a cherry on the cake. This is why I am dismissive of the “resource curse” argument as well. Another loser’s argument.
Norway is rich because of Norwegians, not because of its geographic position. Geographic determinism is a loser’s argument. Japan was also economically isolated and also had very little natural resources when the Meiji restoration began. Yet Japan had the most important resource of all: high human capital.
The fact that you have to reach these bizarre convolutions to excuse away Russia’s mediocre growth trajectory is a sign that you’re out of wits. That’s fine. I don’t claim to hold all the answers either. I’m still coming to grips with this question, and so are many other people.
So in Spain, they sell this type of already prepared bread for 20 cents. The dough arrives at the bakery, and then they cut it up and bake the dough.
You can see at 7:50 in the video – the 20 cent bread bread looks the same from externally as the 80 cent bread. However, the difference in quality is only known when you taste it.
Also you can can see at 8:32 how the dough arrives.
The 20 cent bread arrives as pieces of preprepared dough, which they then cut up and bake the dough in the oven. Quality standards of bread collapses because of people trying to save a few cents – they now produce bread to sell to the public for 0.20 cents, but this is clearly bad thing for Spain, not a good thing. (As often, low prices is not something to celebrate in relation to food).
The only thing I am jealous of. Though I wouldn’t have minded if it was -16 instead.
Winter is comfy af. Also, “severe” 🙂
https://i.imgur.com/UbQvDOp.jpg
This supposedly translates to the English, “burst through.” I don’t get it.
Would anyone like to share a better translation/meaning for Прорвало?
I believe that this should continue until they complete the conflation of you and Nick Land, and possibly a space-time teleporting Duginist clone of you.
From Toronto Russian’s link:
https://i.imgur.com/IlZmtLe.jpg
Totally non-trivial! And I like how you completely sidestepped his point about social etiquette: people in Toronto are simply nicer to each other and this attitude shift matters. It’s not ‘gay’ to care about.
The dismissal/ignoring of his complaints is especially ironic after you promoted Varpad’s thoughtful essay on why some EEs may stay in the West due to better social attitudes than back home. Well, you just unwittingly used yourself as a live human experiment to prove his point. Well done. Swine right, is what it is called.
Propaganda aside (propaganda is always a bunch of lies – simple test: did you ever hear of propaganda of the times table? That’s because times table is true), I’d expect a significant decrease in the fraction of Russian residents wanting to emigrate. In the USSR very few people had a chance to visit other countries, and even those visited only as tourists for a short time, so the myth that the West is the land of plenty flourished. Now many Russians work abroad, so the population must be better informed. More people should be aware that Western prosperity is largely a myth, quite a few European countries have lower living standards than modern Russia. In terms of living standards, Russians are in the top 10-15% in the world. In the US more than half of the population lives somewhat better, but the difference is maybe 50%, not manifold, as the popular myths claimed in Soviet times. In addition, even in modern “capitalist” Russia many still enjoy Soviet-era freebies. People own the apartments they’ve got for free in the USSR, the rent is relatively low (the rent you pay to the local authorities, that is; if you rent from individual people, like in Moscow, you pay through the nose), some healthcare is still free, as well as higher education (if you have good grades), etc. Nothing is free in the US. When you subtract necessary unavoidable expenses, not much is left as disposable income for the 95% of the population. So, stable numbers suggest that the myths are still alive, despite evidence that directly contradicts them. Well, nothing new there, people believed ridiculously implausible BS for millennia.
Russia has better trains than Sweden.
The grass is always greener…
Moscow is as safe as European cities were before Europe committed suicide by letting in “refugees” from real shitholes. But even now many European cities are safer than most American cities. Heck, Mexico city, Buenos Aires, and Lima (at least the downtown, don’t know about barrios/favelas) are safer than most US cities.
https://www.nbcnews.com/feature/nbc-out/toronto-pop-spa-staffed-exclusively-hiv-positive-healers-n942571
Europeans and Russians mean very different things by “huge distances”. Say, the distance from Warsaw to Madrid is enormous by European standards (2,850 km by the road), but the distance from Moscow to Novosibirsk is 3,390 km by the road, and there is further 5,700 km from Novosibirsk to Vladivostok. The flight from Moscow to Vladivostok is more than 8 h, longer than from NY to London (6-7 h, ~5,580 km).
Not too far. In Russian you say “Прорвало” when someone bursts out with his preconceived ideas (or received wisdom), showing his/her true colors. Like, if you pretend to be highly cultured, then stumble and issue a string of base profanities.
Russian non-PC expression is “the dick is always thicker in someone else’s hands”.
Communist rule created such a transport network, though.
https://twitter.com/Irkutyanin1/status/1192308870997323776
https://twitter.com/Irkutyanin1/status/1192308878786138113
Estonia is doing so “well” that its population both declines and increase in average age every year. If they keep doing this well, they’ll have half their current tiny population in 25 years.
Congratulations on reaching levels of homosexuality previously thought impossible.
Those people weren’t nonwhite. Turks such as the Tatars, Khazars, Ashina tribe, etc were descended from white Europeans like the Scythians. Descendants of the Ottoman Turk rulers carry a Scythian paternal lineage (R1a-Z93). The Borjigin Mongols carried the Y-DNA haplogroups R1a and R1b, and were described as red haired and blue eyed.
Yes, but this is a road, not where people walk:
https://i.imgur.com/IlZmtLe.jpg
Makes cars dirty and full of salt but who cares?
I’ve been in Moscow many times in winter and the slush wasn’t so terribly noticeable. However global warming makes it more common.
I was lolling because you are apparently an Indian(?).
Now for the rest of this bizarre comment:
First of all, I don’t know how Italy came into it at all. Second, I myself pointed out the fact that North-Western Europe was itself a relatively backwards place until relatively recently in history. Perhaps you should read more carefully.
What does any of this have to do with my comments? My original statements about the climate were to correct Thomm’s characteristic ignorance. I never made any statements about the origin Nordic countries’ prosperity other than to argue that they weren’t really comparable to Russia, and I never argued that Russia’s climate was the origin of its problems.
That said, I should take the time to correct you, too: Even the capital of Norrbotten, Lulea, is milder than Moscow. You may want to read up on these things a little bit.
Capping off your ill-informed response with snideness makes you look pretty stupid.
I always saw this as a pleasant and exotic thing, much better than the rats that one sees more of in New York or Chicago. Moscow street dogs also tend to be very attractive. For climactic reasons they are furry, and have a husky-like or Eurasier-like look to them. If someone turned the into a breed they would probably be a popular one.
Here are some that aren’t so furry:
https://cdn.junglecreations.com/wp/junglecms/2017/08/GettyImages-814025374-compressor.jpg
There was a native pack in a fancy place where some of my in-laws live. They were polite, never bothered anyone.
A few years ago I saw a feral dog on the metro. Got on, walked up and down the train. An old lady gave him a piece of sausage from a bag she was carrying. He got off at the next stop. Also very well-behaved, didn’t make a sound.
A few years ago one of my kids who was little started barking for fun; it was somewhere in the center of the city. Seemingly out of nowhere about a dozen dogs appeared. This was a bit unsettling, but they didn’t do anything.
I would hardly describe such experiences as “degrading.”
Legacy of failed and stupid Sovok civil “engineering.”
Oops. Allow me to correct: Lulea is somewhat colder than Moscow. I should read more closely too.
However, even with this in mind, most of Northern Sweden is still remarkably temperate. As far North as Harnosand, the climate is still milder than Moscow, and Lulea is “only” more temperate than Novosibirsk, Yekaterinburg, Kazan, etc., some of the most populous cities in Russia.
Indeed, the Moscow street dogs are very friendly, and it is sad there exist subhuman psychopaths who go around killing and poisoning them.
You must be incredibly pampered to consider stepping over large puddles a degrading experience. As if there aren’t large muddy puddles of water in Canada.
This is very subjective.
?
Europe has a bad immigration policy, but still no need to exaggerate – Europe isn’t dangerous at all, beyond some incidents like terrorist attacks, which are as statistically less common by individual as lightning strikes.
The “most dangerous” city in Western Europe, is safer than the most safe city in America, and safer than most Russian cities as well.
Politics of Western Europe has become so gentle and emasculated, partly because Western European man has been one of the first in human history to live from childhood in a world where few people will experience violence in their life – which is an unnatural, or at least historically unprecedented, condition for man.
By comparison, America is still a real jungle (although statistically America is also becoming a lot safer since the 1980s).
Yeah, I find Arpad’s argument that people leave to go to the west for the work environment, of all things, questionable.
I don’t know about Moscow, to say about Toronto’s experience of Moscow. Moscow is a city with comparatively warm winters (i.e. includes warmer days in winter when ice can melt and partially drain), smooth asphalt and infinite municipal money – so, how bad can it be?
But as a general topic, puddles are no joke, including if you are driving a car. This happens because of melting ice after months, in the spring, uneven road surface and drainage. But the only dangerous one is a leak of boiling water.
Toronto in Canada might have good drainage systems. In addition, Toronto probably does not have a problem of leaking boiling water, if people heat water in their buildings.
Never been to Moscow, I was just going by the pictures she posted. I see stuff like that every year.
I’d guess that most North American cities have better infrastructure than most Russian cities, and things like potholes, road surfaces, drainage etc. are probably less of a problem, and cities with harsh winters tend to have shittier roads in general. I just think it’s ridiculous to say that large puddles are such a degrading experience that they’d make you want to move countries, that’s just silly.
Am I alone in this? Perhaps I have just gotten used to the terrible, oppressive puddles, to the point that I don’t realize the extent of my degradation.
Roads in Detroit are worse than roads in Moscow.
Nonsense.
Glasgow has a homicide rate of 5.1/100,000 and Belfast of 3.3/100,000:
https://www.cheatsheet.com/culture/most-dangerous-cities-in-europe.html/
In Naples it is 3.9.
Seattle (3.7) and New York (3.4) have lower homicide rates than Glasgow and Naples. San Jose (3.1), El Paso (2.8), Austin (2.6) and San Diego (2.5) have lower homicide rates than Glascow, Naples and Belfast.
Also keep in mind that American homicides tend to be skewed among a segregated sub-population of African-Americans and rarely affect others. There is no more a jungle where most American lives as in Europe.
Also, much of Western Europe has more robberies than America:
https://www.theglobaleconomy.com/rankings/robery/
Belgium, Spain, Portugal, UK and France
Roads in Nashville deteriorated in the last 18 years, whereas roads in Moscow improved. Today roads in Moscow are better than roads in Nashville. BTW, in contrast to Moscow, a harsh winter in Nashville means only a few degrees below freezing.
So did you, but when it turned out that the facts didn’t match your spin, suddenly it is a bad thing. And this poll is comparable across years back. Looking at the relevant age groups, it shows the opposite of your spin. Suddenly it isn’t convenient anymore.
Yikes.
That’s interesting. I can’t say much for the roads of Northeast Ohio, which in many ways are in a state of permanent reconstruction. What I can say for sure is that the quality of the Ohio Turnpike has declined over the last 20 years. It formerly had a better reputation, and was run by a different agency. But when semi trucks were allowed to speed up to 70mph (113km/h), road damage considerably increased.
I was last in Indiana 10 years ago, and the roads were horrid, not sure if that’s changed.
Michigan has awful roads, the Dem Governor won election last year on a platform of “fix the damn roads”.
So you’ve been to Detroit? What’s it like over there?
I do not know how accurate is the description of corruption mechanism by your lawyer friend but I can easily imagine that it is very true because this is how corruption works everywhere. The difference is the scope. When it is excessive it chokes the economy and creates lots of resentment but below some critical level it is just a process of wealth extraction and reassignment within the propertarian class. The success of 19/20 century America was built by such corruption and the late coming of Germany into the success story of the economic development was because of lower level of this kind of corruption than in America.
Superficially a hellhole, but beneath the surface an interesting place with wildly different facets. Elements of Walking Dead, great music scenes, beautiful crumbling ruins, huge empty factories where people threw massive parties, mile after mile of the ugliest and most boring suburbs in America, charming well-policed rich piece of New England on Lake St. Clair right next to the ghetto, Eastern Europeans and Arabs (most of whom, in Detroit, are Christians), small islands of prosperity within the city patrolled by private security (like in Walking Dead among the zombies).
Much of the city is in ruins, and nature has come back. I’ve seen a pheasant when driving through the city. Here are some ruins:
https://i.imgur.com/KjTLj3v.jpg
https://assets3.roadtrippers.com/uploads/blog_post_section/attachment/image/164988/blog_post_section/attachment-image-4f69ef06-dd12-433c-a65d-8f2f2a560bb7.jpg
http://www.renegadetribune.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/Detroit-Ruins-Detroit-Michigan-%C2%A9-2011-Joe-Braun-Photography.jpg
The sort of place where in the early to mid 90s there were huge illegal parties, where local gangs were paid off to keep the cars and people safe:
https://www.hecktictravels.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/12/Detroit-Abandoned-Fisher-Body-Plant-006.jpg
Even Glasgow has a lower murder rate than the safest US cities.
Glasgow’s murder rate is 2.16 per 100,000 (I just myself calculated from 2018 official Scotland’s government data). It’s only high by local standards. Scotland’s murder rate is 1.1 per 100,000. (Which is lower than any American state).
You can blame murder problems on African Americans – but the whitest US cities are also have higher murder rates, than the blackest Western European cities.
For example, London had the highest murder rate for 10 years, last year – it was 1.52 per 100,000 people.
If this data means things like your girlfriend’s handbag stolen if she leaves it in the cafe – then e.g. Spanish cities like Barcelona are one of the worst places in the world.
But the severity of this type of crime is low (buy a new bag, watch your things when in Barcelona, etc).
Therefore, people in Spain, do not feel exactly terrorized by crime, unlike populations in countries with high homicide rates.
Personally, I agree. A normal cold puddles of melted ice, in Spring, is nothing very serious – it just means you wear cheap shoes, or can even buy some waterproof shoes. (Just don’t wear expensive clothes those days).
Boiling water puddles, on the other hand, are a bit scary. When the boiling water leaks spreads around and cools, it’s just amusing
But when it breaks under the road – e.g. in Tyumen, last month. It’s lucky people no-one was cooked like a lobster.
Last month, in Penza, two people were killed by boiling to death alive inside their car, when their car falls into a puddle of boiling water under the road.
A lot of American highway and automobile related infrastructure will reach its 70 year birthday soon. (Interstate highway system was constructed from the 1950s).
There must be enormous need for reconstruction/replacement of infrastructure. Lifespan of a bridge is normally maximum of 70 years. So how many bridges will need to be replaced in the highway system?
Communists and tribe happened. Just like it happens in the West today.
Communists labelled early period of 20th century in Russia as period of decline and despair. Ironically, Russian economy/GDP during this period before WWI was growing faster then any other major European economy (UK, France, Italy or Germany). Only US demonstrated higher levels of growth.
Because their elites are Chinese.
Among 20 richest Russians
Mikhelson, Fridman, Abramovich, Vekselberg, Khan, Deripaska (30%) – Jews or Jewish descent. Where do you think their loyalty is?
Alekperov, Kerimov, Usmanov, Makhmudov (20%) – different historically Muslim ethnic groups.
Compare with the list of richest Chinese.
The only comparable thing is that ~20% of EU citizens and Russians have expressed a desire to emigrate over the past decade.
You may want to read up on these things a little bit.
See what I mean. You want to take all the fun out of it by becoming informed.
Way to miss the whole point, Sherlock.
Obviously resource extraction got more important during the 20th century, hence larger populations to extract it were required.
That wasn’t the point. The point is that Russia has always been expanding northwards and eastwards, for important political, geographic and cultural reasons. Russia has been doing that even when resource extraction wasn’t as important.
Telling Russians to abandon Siberia is like telling Americans to abandon the American West because it’s too dry.
I.e., completely pants-on-head potato-tier retarded.
Well … hardly ever.
Why not add journalists running chaotically in between each line of buses? Just a suggestion.
This is very recent improvement. Until a couple of years ago Glasgow’s homicide rate was around 5, higher than in New York, Seattle, San Diego, San Jose, Austin, El Paso.
Even the low rate of 2.16 is higher than in a bunch of cities surrounding Phoenix (each with about 250,000 people but collectively about 750,000 people) and nearly the same as San Diego (population 1.4 million, homicide rate 2.46).
So you are still wrong.
Functionally it is a meaningless difference. If you feel safe with a murder rate of 1.1 you are not going to be scared with a murder rate of 2.1 (about trhe same as Estonia, and lower than Hungary – are thee places a “jungle”?). There are a bunch of mostly-white US states with a homicide rate of 2 or lower:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._states_by_homicide_rate
Overall, white homicide rate in the USA is 2.96:
https://www.colorlines.com/articles/where-does-your-state-rank-when-it-comes-black-homicide
Higher than western Europe and Visegrad, lower than former USSR. If you adjust by state, northern US whites are probably in Visegrad territory while those in the South are probably like ex-USSR.
Hardly a “jungle.”
No, you are talking about theft. Robbery is someone showing you a knife, or beating you up, and taking your wallet or purse or doing that to a clerk in a store.
https://www.lawyers.com/legal-info/criminal/types-of-crimes/what-s-the-difference-between-theft-and-robbery.html
The crimes of theft (sometimes known as “larceny”) and robbery both involve taking someone else’s money or property without permission. The main difference between the offenses is that robbery involves the use of force or intimidation. Because robbery involves force, it is usually considered a more serious crime than theft.
::::::
So while you are about equally unlikely to be killed if you are a European in either America or Europe, you are noticeably more likely to be robbed in many western European countries than in the USA. This is probably because the Western European legal system tolerates criminals and allows them to be out on the streets.
FWIW I agree with AP here.
Yes, even white areas of the US may be marginally more dangerous than in Europe. But it is very nice to not generally have to worry about pickpockets and burglars.
Or people upending a flash of acid on your face and running off with your phone, as is the new trend in Sadiq Khan’s London.
My crime experiences:
(1) 10 years in the US – Crazed Negro once made off with my burger (it was replaced for free); crazed Negro woman vaguely threatened group of people I was with a knife and slashed a trampoline.
(2) 3 months in London – Cell phone stolen.
(3) Almost 3 years in Russia – Nothing that I can recall.
Untrue.
Knowing the guy in question who wrote it initially to some extent, he was being actively yelled at in his job and arguably the opposite was true: while he was making some money, he was neither getting basic respect(of not being yelled at) nor really feeling like he was fulfilling any purpose(due to waste in the project). That and casual acceptance of nepotism and bullying, which might be all very conservative but its plenty unpleasant to live in when you’re smart, capable and want to do something for the world.
In the West now, there is plenty of pozzing but at least no one yells at him. He doesn’t have to socialize with people he doesn’t like in the work and pretend to be their friends and laugh at their jokes(all which takes away more time from doing what he might want otherwise). His work might still be pointless, but at least they’re nicer about it and everyone can pretend it is important.
Perhaps it is atomistic, but there are times when the impersonal machine is more pleasant than the personal nastiness of humanity.
So you can find a few small cities of 250,000 in America,which have a lower murder rate, than the “murder capital of Europe”.
It proves a point.
London, in the most “murder epidemic year for a decade”, has a murder rate of 1.5 per 100,000. This city is the centre of black gangs and violence
Whereas in America, people might boast when they can find (but not name) a medium-small city of 250,000, that has have a murder rate below 2.1.
It’s not meaningless either in the real world (it means twice as many murders), or for the perception of Western European people.
You can see how much panic there is in London now, because its murder rate reached 1.52 last year (English media is writing about the terrible murders in London every week, and the television is discussing what a disaster it is that murder is so high and common in London).
Meanwhile, America’s low crime and safe cities like Salt Lake City, have a murder rate of 5.13 per 100,00.
Even a rural, bourgeois, white state like Vermont, has a higher murder rate than stone jungles like London .
What’s very common in a couple of Western European countries, or at least Spain, is people take your phone or your wallet when you don’t see them. This is not a violent kind of robbery.
Cultural response, is that Spanish people typically always watch their bags, phones, wallets, very carefully, if you go out with them (in any other country).
This is a very small adjustment – i.e. don’t leave your bag unattended -, and it’s not like being terrorized by real crime.
Another kind of robbery or theft in Spain is that shop cashiers very often try to trick you by giving you the wrong change. It’s like some kind of sport there to trick people with the wrong change.
Meanwhile, with all this small crime that happens in Spain, the murder rate is 0,6 for every 100,000 people, and the effect on normal life does not seem very great.
With a small sample size, you might find a fellow whose phone was stolen by robbers in London, just as you can find people who got terrible sunburn from their holiday in Sweden.
It’s not going to be common however (people I know who work in London, are surprised how they don’t experience crime). London also has video cameras on most streets, so I doubt it’s a very easy place to have a career as a robber.
And being electrocuted by lightning, on a sunny day – might be a new trend for sunny days, if you believe the English media (there are articles in websites like Daily Mail).
I’m not interested enough to research myself. But in case anyone is – what do we think is the “acid on your face to steal your phone” victim rate per 100,000 of the population?
What’s the point of having cameras when police are more interested in thoughtcriminals on Twitter than actual criminals on the streets?
Not large, but it’s a class of crime that pretty much doesn’t exist in the US, period.
Well, it;’s not as if Russia is Israel or some other shit hole.
Forty percent of Israeli Jews say they would emigrate if only they could.
I suppose Russia’s a real country; not some ideological invention. Russians live in Russia.
Censorship of internet is unpleasant, but I doubt this is resulting in lack of attention to street crime (especially as in UK, streets are very safe in general – the English state is effective in creating all kinds of order).
Lol I would place my bet this is more likely in an American street.
Well, I calculated for myself just now, and Israel seem to have an extremely low emigration rate relative to its population.
Net negative emigration from Israel in 2017, was 0.06%, by my calculation. For comparison, emigration of British citizens from UK was 0.36% in 2015 – I calculated with the same methodology for 2015 data.
So Israel’s net negative emigration rate is around 6 times lower than UK’s.
In relation to Russia – more Russian citizens are immigrating to Israel this year, than total number of Israelis who are emigrating from Israel to all countries.
Russian immigration to Israel will exceed 15,000 a year this year. While Israel’s total net negative emigration was 5,800 people (in 2017, the latest year reported).
They are next to each other (Scottsdale, Chandler and Gilbert Arizona) and although each only has 250,000 people together have 750,000 people, which is more than Glasgow.
You wrote: “The “most dangerous” city in Western Europe, is safer than the most safe city in America”
This was clearly wrong.
Of course the difference between a murder rate of 1/100,000 and 2/100,000 is meaningless. It is a difference of .00001. At that low number “doubling” is meaningless.
It means rather than all things being equal, instead of having a .001% chance of being murdered it is .002%.
It is silly hysteria, akin to warnings about eating sausage doubling the rate of some cancer (which really means, increasing risk of it from 0.001% to .002% or something similar).
OTOH robbery is a lot more common, and here many Western European nations are indeed much more dangerous than European America.
Did you even read my post before replying?
I already explained to you that theft (what you describe) is not robbery.
https://www.lawyers.com/legal-info/criminal/types-of-crimes/what-s-the-difference-between-theft-and-robbery.html
The crimes of theft (sometimes known as “larceny”) and robbery both involve taking someone else’s money or property without permission. The main difference between the offenses is that robbery involves the use of force or intimidation. Because robbery involves force, it is usually considered a more serious crime than theft.
Also again:
Much of Western Europe has more robberies than America:
https://www.theglobaleconomy.com/rankings/robery/
Belgium, Spain, Portugal, UK and France.
So robbery rate in London was 420/100,000 in 2010 (the last year wiki gives). In New York it was 198/100,000. Less than half.
So you may be about equally unlikely to get killed in New York as in London, but you are much more likely to have someone pull out a knife and take your wallet, or throw acid in your face and take your wallet, or hit you on the head and take your wallet, in London or Paris or Madrid than you are in New York (incidentally, a colleague of mine was jumped and had his wallet taken by some teenagers in Madrid last year. This had never happened to him in the USA).
‘… So you may be about equally unlikely to get killed in New York as in London, but you are much more likely to have someone pull out a knife and take your wallet, or throw acid in your face and take your wallet, or hit you on the head and take your wallet, in London or Paris or Madrid than you are in New York (incidentally, a colleague of mine was jumped and had his wallet taken by some teenagers in Madrid last year. This had never happened to him in the USA).’
Well, New York is fixing that. Stay tuned.
‘Lol I would place my bet this is more likely in an American street.’
Obviously, it depends on which ‘American street.’ San Francisco is a bit of an outlier. Any resemblance between it and any place else is purely coincidental.
It is not talking about risk possibilities, but actualized killings, with dead bodies, sad families, etc.
295 people were killed in New York last year, while 128 people were killed in London with a larger population.
You can say that it is low in both cases – but that depends on your point of comparison. New York is low, compared to other American cities, or 1980s New York. But compared to Europe, New York is high, and 295 is more than the total number of murders in some countries.
For example, in Netherlands, 76 people were killed in 2017. ( Netherlands has 17.18 million people, compared to New York’s population of 8.623 million)
Robbery is being differently defined in different countries. Moreover, reporting rate will be lower (as it usually is not such a serious crime).
How dangerous these robberies are, will also be partly tracked by the murder rate.
In countries with high murder rates, we can infer the typical robberies will be more dangerous, than in countries with low murder rates.
It’s also possible to compare violent crime rates (although there could be a difference in definition of violent crime between countries).
New York has a violent crime rate of 585.8 per 100,000 for 2016 (according to Wikipedia). Los Angeles has violent crime rate of 927.7 per 100,000 for 2016.
London seems to have violent crime rate of 270 per 100,000.
There could be difference in definitions – but from a “brief look” at the violent crime rates, London definitely seems to be a lot lower.
San Francisco is one of the most charming cities in the world; but they need to prepare tourists that it is where America settles a lot of its homeless, drug addicts, disabled beggars and mentally ill people.
I had a little culture shock walking such streets.
I got relatively immune to beggars, psychos, and homeless in the streets in four years in Philadelphia. But seeing men kissing each other in SF streets almost made me puke.
Even before the recent homeless epidemic, I was never impressed by it. Nice Victorian architecture and hills (Pittsburgh has both) plus ocean, but cold nasty windy weather and unpleasant people.
San Diego is the nicest large city in California. Santa Barbara is nicest overall.
You were talking about homicide rates and a place being some kind of violent jungle, so this is probability of getting killed. Well yes, and the difference is meaningless. Close to zero in both cases.
About 114 pedestrians were killed by traffic in New York compared to 73 in London. In your world should people be scared to walk around in New York? In the real world no – it’s freak occurrence in both places. As is homicide.
So a difference of 167 people in a city of 8900000.
In English (still used in London) it is defined specifically as taking something from someone using force or the threat of force.
From wiki:
Recording of robbery offences in England and Wales are sub-divided into Business Robbery (robbery of a business, e.g. a bank robbery) and Personal Robbery (taking an individuals personal belongings with force/threat).[57] Annually business robbery offences in London account for on average 10% of total robbery offences.
Rate of robbery in London is two times higher than in New York. And unlike murder, which is very rare in both cities, robbery is common enough that people are at reasonable risk of falling victim to it. It is 420/100,000 in London vs. 198/100,000 in New York.
This is much murkier than specific crimes such as “robbery” or “homicide.” Robbery is relatively common but twice as high in London. Homicide is extremely rare but twice as high in New York. There are 167 more people killed in New York than in London. But about 20,000 more people were robbed in London than in New York (that is, forced to give up something at knifepoint, beaten up and had something taken, had acid thrown in their face and had something taken, etc.). This is a real risk that can actually happen to someone, at a noticeably higher rate in London than in New York.
It’s a price Londoners pay for living in a country that doesn’t believe in incarcerating criminals. New York is about to follow London’s lead with its new bail reforms, so it will catch up in a few years.
‘San Francisco is one of the most charming cities in the world; but they need to prepare tourists that it is where America settles a lot of its homeless, drug addicts, disabled beggars and mentally ill people.’
I grew up across the Bay from it, my grandmother was born there in 1901, etc.
You need to understand the population of the city has been virtually completely replaced over the last fifty years. You might as well compare Kaliningrad to Königsberg.
752 acid attacks in London last year:
https://www.standard.co.uk/news/crime/london-is-acid-attack-hotspot-of-western-world-with-victims-as-young-as-10-a4222921.html
So it is rare, but the number is rising every year.
I haven’t time right now to investigate, but it will surely not be the case in your specific definition (where you say it is with violence), as violent crime is more than 2 times higher in New York than in London.
New York has a violent crime rate of 585.8 per 100,000 for 2016 (according to Wikipedia). Los Angeles has violent crime rate of 927.7 per 100,000 for 2016. London has a violent crime rate of 270 per 100,000
These are real people killed, however, and differences of hundreds of such deaths every year adds to quite a lot (like the death numbers from a small war).
Moreover, murder also does not just affect the victim, but their family, people they know, etc.
E.g. If you know about 200 people in a city. Then murder rate of 5 per 100,000 – if randomly distributed -, can imply 80% chance someone you know will be murdered if you live to 80.
Whereas at the low Spanish murder rate of 0.6, it is only 9,6% chance.
San Francisco has a real city atmosphere in the centre (e.g. near Union Square), and many beautiful streets and historic buildings, while San Diego – not really.
Although, I think I might also prefer to live in San Diego, because of the convenience for travelling across the border to Mexico (as well as the fact it is not drowning in homeless people).
It was just perfect sunny weather when I visited (in early summer).
The police were disinterested in my case and dropped it after a week.
Of course on the bright side that’s still more attention than what they devoted to the Paki rape gangs… (at reigning in the perpetrators, anway, they devoted quite a lot of attention to prosecuting the parents for racism).
“LOL”, indeed. Acid attacks are not a thing in the US. It is a freak occurrence when it does happen. In London, they are regular headline news.
Watching the decline of SF in real time was depressing, and I am glad I got out when I did, people tell me it has if anything now accelerated.
Glasgow and Belfast suffered from sectarian violence known as ‘The Troubles’, until recently. So not really fair comparisons.
I have had my wallet stolen once, by some blacks on the NY subway.
Crime stats are unreliable, murders are the gold standard as they have to be recorded and a dead body can’t be ignored.
It is violence or the the threat of violence. So if I show you a knife and demand your wallet, or if I stab you and take it – this is robbery.
If I steal a purse from a table and run off, this is theft, not robbery.
It is not my definition, it is how it is defined by both American and British legal systems.
This is a less specific and more vague definition than “robbery.”
Yes, a difference close to zero.
LOL, 80% of Americans do not know someone personally who has been murdered. You are off by a decibel. It would be an 8% chance, over a lifetime, of knowing someone among the 200 people you know who has been murdered.
Most people do not know 200 people (I would not classify, say, seeing someone on an elevator every day, or a classmate one never sees outside class, as “knowing” someone). And kids do not know 200 people. For purposes of mourning and being affected emotionally by a murder it is probably 50 at most (siblings, parents, grandparents, aunts/uncles, 1st cousins, real friends). This means a 2% chance over 80 years (of course, it would be over 70 years as little kids don’t know 50 people so you should start at age 10).
Of course, homicide rate among white people in the USA is about 3/100,000, and 20/100,000 among blacks. Black people are likely to know someone who has been murdered (40% chance over a lifetime if they know 200 people and live to 80).
I don’t know a single person who has been murdered (of course, I am not black). Nor do any of my friends or relatives. Thinking of anyone I ever knew over my life – I once worked with a nurse (Latina) a few years ago when her friend (also Latina) was killed by a boyfriend. A friend’s daughter had a black friend in high school who was bused in from a ghetto in another town, who was killed by a black guy in her apartment building (the friend, a Russian, told her understandably upset daughter that that’s what happens to black people).
But I know a person who was hit by lightning (and survived).
I do know several people who have been robbed, however, both in the USA and Europe. My colleague, after visiting Madrid, said to never go there because it is dangerous. He was beaten up by a gang of teenagers who took his wallet and camera. He had never been robbed in the USA despite living here, but 2 weeks in Spain and he was robbed. Spain has a higher rate of robbery than the USA. It has a lower murder rate but as I have explained to you murder is extremely rare in both countries.
Not Glasgow.
Glasgow did, stabbing someone because they support Rangers or Celtic.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nil_by_Mouth_(charity)
Also a lot of gang violence fueled by sectarian rivalry.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Billy_Boys
I don’t think police in any country would be interested that your phone is stolen – one hour of police investigation, could probably pay for several new phones.
It would be 80%, after 80 years, at the rate of 5 murders per hundred thousand, if you know 200 people and the victims were evenly distributed in the population, as was the sample of people you knew (according to attributes relevant for these purposes).
The reason it is not like this in real life, because victims are not evenly distributed – and neither is the sample of 200 people you know.
Similarly, your chance of being murdered after 80 years is 0,4% at 5 murders per hundred thousand. (But that is if homicide victims would be random, including in relation to their age and stage of life)
So, if you knew 200 white people, it would be 48% chance (if murders were evenly distributed and so was your sample) after 80 years that one would be murdered.
I know (acquaintance, not friend) someone who was murdered (or killed during a fight).
But I also must have known far more than 200 people so far (I think it is more like 1000+). I know people who were in my school, who have died already in ways which would seem unlikely.
Were they in Lavapiés, with illegal immigrants? Or perhaps near some dangerous Colombian bar or something?
Have you lived in San Francisco? How was it to live there?
My impression is that it is one of the most charming and beautiful cities in America.
But it is also probably the only city I have walked around, where in 100 metres you can transition from an extremely bourgeois street, to one full of homeless one-arm people.
I can’t agree more with you.
Just look at this mess right in the center of Moscow. How many years passed, but Sobyanin still can’t make things straight!
https://postmediacanadadotcom.files.wordpress.com/2013/05/slush.jpg
The well-known Sobyanin’s pavement made by semi-literate unqualified Tajiks. Everybody knows how corrupt all this pavement scheme is!
https://mcfcrandall.files.wordpress.com/2019/03/blog_cntower_reflection_sidewalk.jpg
Just piles and piles of dirty snow nobody is going to clear! Right in the center!
https://mcfcrandall.files.wordpress.com/2019/03/blog_king_university_intersection.jpg
Slippery!
https://mcfcrandall.files.wordpress.com/2019/03/blog_snow_shoe_alley.jpg
In a normal country this car would be crystal clear. But not in Putin’s Russia.
https://mcfcrandall.files.wordpress.com/2019/03/blog_dirty_blue_car.jpg
These poor children have to walk through this hell every day on the way to school, all their miserable childhood. I hope when they grow up, they immigrate to Canada.
https://mcfcrandall.files.wordpress.com/2016/12/blog_walking_home_after_school.jpg
Some more pictures from the backyard of Russia, REAL Russia they’ll never show you on Kremlin’s TV. You can just feel the sheer horror and desperation of life in Putin’s Russia.
https://mcfcrandall.files.wordpress.com/2016/12/blog_gerrard_street_snow_houses.jpg
https://mcfcrandall.files.wordpress.com/2016/12/blog_winter_tree_snowy_lane.jpg
https://mcfcrandall.files.wordpress.com/2016/12/blog_sunflower_mural_snowy_alley.jpg
https://mcfcrandall.files.wordpress.com/2019/04/blog_you_miss_100.jpg
https://mcfcrandall.files.wordpress.com/2019/03/blog_side_entrance_mocassin.jpg
I can post a bunch of similar or even more appalling pics from Nashville, TN (except for the piles of snow – in TN half-an-inch of snow is a catastrophe, local drivers can’t handle it, they are bad enough w/o any snow). I could have had the same kind of pics from many cities in Canada (Toronto, Montreal, Edmonton, Vancouver), if I were interested in taking those pics. Does this mean that the life in the US or Canada is “sheer horror and desperation”? Of course not.
People who did not achieve anything to boast about after emigration do need to convince themselves that they ran from “horror and desperation”. Otherwise, they’d have to acknowledge that they are losers, who brought their nature with them to a new country. Virtually nobody is prepared to acknowledge an inconvenient truth.
I always thought that you hated everything and your posts do not disappoint. Nonetheless, I must express my admiration of the sheer extent and documentation by which you express your disgust for everything in existence. It is no mere griping, which is common enough, but genuine effort that you put in to explore, record, and explain how in the end that everything is fact made up of only the ridiculous, ugly and the pointless in equal measures.
That’s not how probability works.
For example you have a 50% chance of getting heads when you flip a coin. This does not mean that if you flip a coin twice your chances of getting heads one of those times is 100%. It is not cumulative – each time it is the same 50% chance. You could get heads the first time you flip the coin. Or you can flip it 10 times and never get heads. Same thing for 5/100,000 chance of being murdered in a year. It does not mean that, if you lived for 20,000 years, you would be guaranteed to be murdered. Each year would be the same 5/100,000 chance.
Casinos would love to have you as a customer!
Half of American white people do not know someone (out of 200 closest people) who was murdered LOL.
I heard of someone from my high school who developed a drug problem, got involved in some shady busisness, and was shot to death. I recognize the name, have a very vague idea of the face. Not one of 200 people I would claim to know.
I don’t know, I didn’t ask because I don’t know Madrid. Guy speaks Spanish and thought the people who assaulted him spoke Romanian. He goes to New York (Manhattan) and Boston a lot and thinks Madrid is more dangerous.
It’really all in the eye of the beholder. Here’s a winter street scene in Minneapolis from the same sort of neighborhood that Boris N so dutifully laments. In the right hands (and through the right eyes) it can be transformed into a cozy winter cityscape (this painting sold for $1,700 dollars a number of years back, it’s worth a lot more today):
https://wilcockgallery.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/Harriet-ave.jpg
“Harriet Avenue” Olexa Bulavitsky
You have a 75% probability of heads, because of mutual exclusion.
On the other hand, with the murder rate at 5 per 100,000, and your 200 friends, and 80 years – there is no mutual exclusion for the friends (we should see each as independent) so we should multiply.
However, if we treat each year as a different instance as above, then we should use exponent for the years maybe? (I was viewing it just as a simple bloc).
p =0.55247678623
So it should be 55% probability that one of your friends will be murdered at the rate of 5 murders per hundred thousand, if you know 200 people.
Your individual probability of being murdered each year in that example would be
1 – (0.99,995) ^20,000
1 – 0.36787024399385
p = 0.632129756 (for being murdered)
So you will probably be murdered if you live that many years.
You have a 54.88% chance of survival.
So if our lifespan was that long, European vs. American murders rates are the difference between probably dying and probably surviving.
You guys realize he was kidding and being sarcastic/mocking Toronto Russian?
Ok. This still seems absurdly high. Half the people I know have not known someone who was murdered. However when I thought about the guy for my school who was shot because he got involved in drugs, I realized an obvious reason for why 55% of people will not actually know someone who got murdered.
Murders are not only rare, but also they are generally not random. Most people who are killed, are killed either because they are in the criminal world, or killed by spouses or close ones. Only a fraction are killed randomly by strangers that they have no dealings with.
So if the overall homicide rate for white people is 3/100,000, for those not involved in, say, the drug business or crime, and not killed by family members the rate is probably no higher than 1/100,000.
So if yo are a normal person who isn’t involved in gangs or the drug business, and who doesn’t have a lethal spouse , your chance of getting murdered in the USA is close to zero.
On the other hand, robberies are pretty much always done to random people (otherwise the robber would be easily identified). The 3/100,000 European-Americans who get killed or the 1/100,000 Western Europeans who get killed aren’t just anybody. But the 420/100,000 people in London who get robbed vs. the 198/100,000 in New York who get robbed really could be any of us.
So while the odds of being randomly murdered or having a friend randomly murdered are close to zero in both the USA in Europe (so close to zero that a doubled risk in the USA is functionally meaningless), the odds of getting robbed (someone pulling a knife on you and taking your wallet, someone beating you and taking your wallet, etc.) are much higher in several Western European countries than in the USA.
But hey, at least Western Europeans don’t have so many thugs in their prisons.
They are working hard to correct that. By accepting “refugees” Europeans greatly increased the number of thugs in their midst. The only remaining thing is to put at least some of them in prison. Maybe they will have balls to do that.
I have to admit that he got me (& apparently others too). It’s funny now! 🙂
The neighborhood depicted doesn’t look all that spooky and looks a lot like the neighborhood that I grew up in Minneapolis. Today, the same neighborhood is a hodge podge of yuppified remodeled houses and other parts more run down, allsorts of “new immigrants” including Somalis. 🙁
Lol it should be ok. (That earlier absurdity was because I multiplied years like a solid bloc – and I might not have even been drunk and stoned at the time.)
You know 200 people in a space (with a replenishing 100,000 people to keep it simple) where there is murder rate of 5 per 100,000
p=0.01 someone you know will be murdered each year
(0.99)^80 = 0.447523
1 -0.447523
p = 0.552477 someone you know will have been murdered after 80 years.
Sure, it’s unevenly distributed in real life, so will depend on kind of people you know: Tupac’s kind of friends – at least this is the impression from the songs -, will be far more likely to be murdered than Ivanka Trump’s.
Personally I knew a man who was murdered in a fight. In this case, he was middle class and intellectual – but he was 20 or 21 year old when it happened. Also a friend from school has died falling at 3am – but it was again it was a 21 year old man when he died. Men at that age – probably one of the most high risk groups for dying like this (fights, falls, car catastrophes) in any country.
If murder rate (odds of being killed in one year) is p=5/100,000 then the probability P(80 years) (the odd of being killed in your lifetime of n=80 years) is calculated using Bernoulli formula:
P(n=80 years)=np(1-p)^(n-1) = 0.00398423
So your lifetime odds of being murdered are 4 in 1000. If you have say 25 years to live your odds of bing killed in remaining lifetime is 0.0012485 (12 in 10,000).
Now, the second question: What are the odds that one of your N=200 acquaintances will be murdered in the next 25 years?
You use the same Bernoulli formula with p=0.0012485.
P(1 friend out 200 killed in 25 years) =Np(1-p)^(N-1)=2000.0012485(1-0.0012485)^199=0.194738
The probability that 2 out of your 200 friends are killed in next 25 years
P(2 friends out 200 killed in 25 years) =((N-1)N/2)p^2(1-p)^(N-2)=2000.0012485^2(1-0.0012485)^198= 0.0242217
So the probability that at least one of your acquaintances is murdered is higher. You first calculate using Bernoulli formula the probability of nobody getting killed and then subtract it form 1:
P(at least 1 out of 200 friend killed)=1-(1-p)^N = 1 – (1-0.0012485)^200= 0.221087
In the actuarial statistics when p is small like for the odds of being murdered they simplify the calculations of lifetime odds by ignoring the (1-p)^n term, so basically they just take p and multiply by number of years n. Lifetime odds = Years*MurderRate. This overestimates the actual odds but insurance companies may like it that way because they can justify charging you more.
Thank you once again.
Well maybe blacks arent as violent as people think. Almost 1/4 of NYC is “black”. Another 1/4 is Hispanic – mainly from Puerto Rico and the Dominican Republic (manyof them “black”). So if these grouos are zo violemt one would surely expect a higher homicide rate than Naples or Glasgow. But knowing I have some Scottish in me – I know Scottish tempers. So it seems police tactics play a big part in NY.
Also El Paso has a lot of the Mexicans everyone loves to hate… Which we know Mexico has horrific violent wars going on.
I’m a cretin.
In my defense, I didn’t look closely. Those apartment murals are quite common in Russia so I assumed it was Moscow.
Lol that would be a clever motivation – more profitable for insurance companies than an alternative motivation of just wanting to save costs by not needing to buy scientific calculators for their office.
Overestimation is too small to notice if we need to be insured against being murdered in London (murder rate 1.52 per 100,000).
e.g. after 80 years
0.1216% chance of being murdered
vs
0.1215% chance of being murdered
But maybe if we live somewhere like Tijuana (murder rate 138 per 100,000), we should remember to check our life insurance agent has a calculator in the office.
E.g. after 80 years
11.04% chance of being murdered
vs
10.45% chance of being murdered
We laugh, but this is one of the Varlamov themes about Canada.
Probably not all Canadians are so cute. My wife two days ago went to visit a family with 4 children which returned from Canada (this family lived in Canada for several years as the head of the family has a job in Canada). This family doesn’t want to go back to Canada because (in their experience) Canadians are terrible people. For this they are now planning how to arrange so that the family lived in St. Petersburg and the head of the family part of the year worked in Canada.
I was once at a country store in Waterbury, Vermont, and struck up a conversation with a Russian family in the processing of buying something. The cashier behind the counter, overhearing us, said, “Oh, you’re Russian?! I’m really sorry, I would’ve been much nicer, but I thought you were Canadian.”
Vermont is close to French Canada, which has a reputation..
Rest of Canada is fake nice.
@Anatoly Karlin
@Thulean Friend
Actually there is a real problem with skilled emigration from Russia no matter how much spin one puts on it.
Latest high profile case is the emigration from Russia of former rising star of russian politics Robert Schlegel, an ethnic German, in the past youngest State Duma MP, number 2 of the Nashi youth mouvement and high profile member of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe delegation from Russia in ’14 at the height of the Crimea reunification and upcoming war in Ukraine., Robert Schlegel got much notice thanks to his very articulate presentation of Russia’s case.
http://www.themoscowtimes.com/2019/12/04/defected-pro-kremlin-lawmaker-resettles-in-germany-a68461
Understanding is that the emigration of so many young talents from Russia is due to huge disappointment people experience in the way the country works (phenomenal corruption, nepotism, general stagnation…) and the perceived lack of prospects for the country.
The emigration of people of such caliber should serve as an alarm and it can’t be just wished away.