Rapidly impoverished: economists assessed the quality of life of Russians

More than half of the citizens of our country (53%) switched to cheaper goods and services for the sake of economy over the past six months. This is evidenced by the results of a study of the BNPL service (“buy now, pay later”) “Shares”, published on September 12. Another third of the respondents (30%) noted that recently they began to think about the need to maintain their own budget. Considering that Russians over 18 years old from all regions of the country participated in the survey, the picture is indicative.

Against the backdrop of the authorities’ announcement of economic stabilization and an incredible nine weeks of deflation, citizens’ incomes are declining. However, not all experts agree with this interpretation of the results. What do the Russians really prepare for, MK figured out

According to the study, over the past six months, 51% of respondents began to buy cheaper household chemicals. 49% of citizens became interested in budget analogues of clothing and footwear. 24% of Russians decided to save on cosmetics and perfumery, and almost 18% on travel.

About 46% of survey participants revised their spending on entertainment – cinema, restaurants, theaters, etc. 40% of Russians in the period from March to August abandoned some expenditure items altogether. More than half (55%) of respondents postponed travel plans, almost one in two (49%) respondents decided not to spend money on large household appliances and electronics (49%), slightly less than half (41%) of the study participants abandoned the idea of ​​buying a car.

The numbers are alarming, but not all experts are in a hurry to sound the alarm. “Not everything is as bad as polls show,” says Andrey Loboda, an economist and director of external relations at BitRiver. — We are living the ninth month with a surplus budget, the fourth record month in a row deflation lasts. People complained about life both during the Soviet period and at the beginning of the well-fed zero years of the new century. Another question is that against the backdrop of the constantly declining purchasing power of the ruble, we have passed the critical point of no return in changing consumer behavior. This happened seven years ago. Indeed, no one likes to overpay, and many Russians have mastered the art of stock shopping.”

According to the expert, over the past almost five months, Russians have seen light at the end of the tunnel in solving personal finance issues with a consistently strong Russian currency. The strong ruble stopped the rise in prices and gave stability when planning expenses. The debt load of Russians remains relatively high, but it is not worth building any negative forecasts today, nothing threatens the financial system. Business activity and domestic demand will really be raised to a new level when the ruble is declared a key investment instrument for the Russian economy, Loboda is sure.

“The assessment of“ expectations ”, which are very elastic to the news background, is significantly exceeded in consumer behavior,” continues the conversation, Associate Professor of the Department of Statistics of the Russian University of Economics. G.V. Plekhanova Olga Lebedinskaya. Citizens have not become poorer, preferring greater discretion in their purchases. With the monthly growth of nominal incomes, inflation, the weekly nominal expenses of Russians varied from 5200 to 5330 rubles.

Despite the savings, the majority of respondents (92.4%) still buy items “off the list”, and 37.7% consider this a great opportunity to “please themselves”. The fact that the situation is slowly but stabilizing in most households is also evidenced by the fact that, for example, according to Romir, by 8%. the share of Russians who have stopped saving on essential goods has decreased. The rejection of expensive purchases is more likely due to the fact that families are not yet ready to revise the structure of expenses and prefer to postpone the solution of this issue, the scientist notes.

But not everyone is so optimistic in interpreting what is happening. “For an accurate understanding of the situation in the Russian consumer sector, it is worth looking at a few numbers,” TeleTrade analyst Alexei Fedorov enters into an argument. – The first is the annual food inflation. In July, the indicator was at the level of 16.76%, if we clear it of fruits and vegetables that become cheaper in summer, then the value will be 18.26%. The second figure is real wages for the year. According to the latest data for June 2022, the indicator decreased by 5.5%. If we compare the two values, we will see that the purchasing power of citizens this year in its food part has decreased by 22-23%. If we add here the psychological characteristics of people’s behavior in a crisis, then there is nothing surprising in the fact that citizens have switched to the “thrifty consumption model” standard for such a situation. So it was in 2008-2009, 2014-2015 and in 2020, the expert noted.

I would like to say something encouraging, in the logic of the fact that inflation in Russia is slowly declining, the economy is adapting, and soon the incomes of citizens will begin to grow. But unfortunately, we have to admit that the worst may yet be ahead.

The thing is that the Russian economy is now only going through a sanctions crisis, and ahead of our country and the whole world a global cyclical recession, similar in scale to the “great recession” of 2008, can await. That is, a strong decline in oil prices may be added to the sanctions this year, which will hit Russia’s state revenues, again fail the ruble exchange rate and increase inflation by the end of this year. It remains to be hoped that the acute phase of the global crisis will occur as late as possible, ideally in the winter of 2022-2023, when reserves have already been made and it will be easier to go through the economic downturn. However, as practice shows, such events in most cases unfold in mid-autumn, so we may have a couple more months to spare, after which the situation will begin to deteriorate rapidly, the expert emphasized.

It is curious that the decline in the standard of living and the increase in the availability of loans should not, according to Fedorov, lead to debt load on Russians. Indeed, the consensus forecast assumes that this Friday, September 16, the Bank of Russia will cut its key rate by another 0.5%, from 8% to 7.5%. However, this does not mean at all that Russian commercial banks will follow the example of the Central Bank of the Russian Federation. They will assess real inflation and political risks, which are clearly not conducive to a further reduction in lending rates.

“On the contrary, we see that the annual growth rate of issuance of loans from March to July 2022 halved from 23.8% to 12.5%,” the analyst points out. “This suggests that the banks themselves are in no hurry to increase their loan portfolio.” So the risks of excess consumer lending are now quite low and are unlikely to have a significant impact on the overall situation, Fedorov stressed.