Social Development and Income Distribution

Abstract

In the post-Soviet period Russia has been experiencing a serious demographic crisis. Since the reforms in January 1992 the Russian population has been steadily declining. In net terms between 1992 and 1999 Russia lost 2.4 million people (Table 4.1). The population fall of 480 000 recorded in 1996, was at the time the steepest decline in any single year since World War II.¹ By 1998 the annual rate of population decline was already more than three-quarters of a million.