Highly qualified professionals of the middle class, feeling excluded from the current economic and political system of the country, to emigrate in search of greener grass on the pastures new. Andrew and Hope are successful professionals and happy family. Such people should be the backbone of the new Russia and the driving force behind its restoration. But they plan to leave the country forever.
They live in the ancient city of Vladimir, which is located 200 kilometers east of Moscow. In 40 -year-old Andrew and 36 -year-old hopes a good job, one bedroom apartment and a car, and two daughters, 10 and four years. Four years ago, they took the firm decision to emigrate. Why not?.
... ... Look at our stores: you almost never find anything that is made in Russia. Our prosperity depends on oil prices and the decisions taken by politicians and economists in other countries. We do not feel that we need here ...
This rigid view of the situation in the country is shared by many Russians. Conducted a survey last year, a respected center ...
Andrew and Hope are part of a new wave of emigration from Russia. There is no full statistics, partly because of the difficulty of fixing departures. According to the Federal Migration Service, about 30,000 people have fled Russia for 11 months last year. However, these data suggest only those who renounced Russian citizenship, whereas the majority of Russian passports to leave. Last year, the Audit Commission published the data, based on tax returns, that the 1.24 million Russians left the country for the past ten years. Other surveys provide data on two million. The shocking fact is that the exodus from Russia after the collapse of the Soviet Union can be compared with the wave of emigration during and after the October Revolution of 1917. Then the Russians fled from violence and hunger. Today they have other motives.
The first post-Soviet wave of emigration, when the 90th years, Russia has left some 1.1 million people, mostly attributed to the removal of the Soviet ban on travel and the country's painful transition from a planned to a market economy. Baffled by the fact that during the reign of Vladimir Putin in the early 2000s a wave of departures has risen again. Anyway, under Putin, Russia has managed to survive the chaos of the 90s, to establish a steady growth and personal incomes have grown substantially. However, economic growth for the most part belonged to the extractive industries, limiting the opportunities for self-. Corrupt bunch of Russian business and government has become unbearable, stifling competition and helping the emergence of billionaire officials. Many feel that the political system increasingly resembles the Soviet Union, where people are few that decide to operate, the parliament was decorative, but the elections were just a laughing stock. At the same time, a sense of social justice, which the Soviet Union was famous, almost disappeared in the new capitalist Russia. Over the past ten years, Russia has earned about 1.6 trillion dollars just from the sale of oil and gas, or more than 11 thousand dollars per person, but the money ended up in the pockets of a few privileged. Today in Moscow, more millionaires than any other capital of the world, but across the country for more than 21 million of 142 million live below the subsistence minimum. In the past year has been poor for two million more than in 2010. This is the data of Rosstat, the state statistics committee.
... ... We are completely alienated from the state, we can not change the government in the elections ...
Who would imagine twenty years ago, that the Russians would leave their country in search of social justice and security? .
... But they may need a few more years to realize his dream of emigrating to Canada, as related to the departure of a long and difficult process.
Focus on the middle class.
Concerned about the fact that the Russian emigration consists of middle-class. Andrew is an educated mechanic and engineer. Hope has two diplomas of higher education in accounting and management. They say that the opportunities to find in their hometown with 350 -thousand population is quite limited. While they expect the move to Canada, Andrew, like many in Vladimir, accepted the offer of better paid work in Moscow. He travels to the capital twice a week to work on a per diem shifts.
... ...
Last month, the Gusev Crystal Factory, a major employer and taxpayer, Gus Crystal, a city an hour's drive from Vladimir with a population of 60,000 people declared themselves bankrupt and laid off the remaining employees. Once known for his glass of copyright, Gus Crystal appointed to take the headlines as a city controlled by gangs. The scandal erupted when residents complained to Putin's massive racketeering, which is encouraged by the local police.
In absolute terms, emigration from Russia is not so large in comparison with other countries. Moreover, it is emphasized by the tide of immigrants from the former Soviet Union. The problem is that the country is losing highly skilled and courageous staff, the cream of society, while most of the guests are uneducated workers from Central Asia.
Professor Anatoly Vishnevsky Institute of Demography of the Higher School of Economics suggests that more than one million people with diplomas of higher education have left Russia for the past 20 years, and the outflow continues.
Some of the best Russian universities are free suppliers of talent to foreign labs. According to a study of the Novosibirsk Branch of the RAS, 70 % of the students of the Novosibirsk State University plan to leave the country after they receive a diploma.
A survey conducted polls were last year, showed that the number of people ever ready to leave Russia, has grown four-fold compared with the moment of collapse of the Soviet Union 20 years ago. Today, 21 % of Russians consider emigration as a chance to self-fulfillment and a better life. Among the educated youth, the percentage of potential immigrants is 39 %.
Compared with 1990, bubbled over the years, when the Russians for the most part traveling in a westerly direction, and many look to the East. Tens of thousands of Siberians, for the most part small and medium entrepreneurs, family business and moved to China in order to avoid bureaucratic pressure at home and racketeering.
... According to him, he left because of business and political climate in Russia is strangled.
... I felt that it was impossible to change anything. You can be successful only in two cases: if you evade taxes, or sitting on an oil pipeline ...
Cynics say that the Kremlin was only too glad that irritated leave the country, and only for this reason they seek to achieve visa-free regime with Europe. The country that lives off oil and gas reserves, does not need skilled workers.
Protests and Political System.
Mass protests against rigged results of parliamentary elections in December showed that many educated people of the Russian cities, instead of packing their suitcases are now ready to take to the streets, demanding reforms and freedoms.
ru.
Peaceful protests have forced the Kremlin to promise to pro-democracy reforms and the 25 million new jobs for highly skilled workers in the next ten years. This gave rise to the hope that many of the potential emigrants postpone or even abandon the idea of leaving.
But Andrew and Hope do not believe that things will change in Russia in their time. They showed the recent news from the local newspaper.
The newspaper reported that a fire in the building of the district administration has destroyed all the ballots from two precincts, where Putin was on 90 % of the vote ( which is two times larger than the average of Vladimir ). What's worse, these polling stations on election day do not opened. Police called faulty wiring caused the fire.
... ...
Original publication:.
The Russians are leaving... Russia.