Russians’ economic optimism at two-decade low – poll

Russians’ economic optimism for 2021 has fallen to a two-decade low, according to a Gallup International poll cited by the RBC news website Wednesday.

The survey results come after a year when Russians’ incomes fell and the double blow of the coronavirus pandemic and declining global oil demand battered the national economy.

The poll said that only 6% of Russian respondents expect 2021 to be a year of prosperity while 47% expect economic hardship.

The score of minus 41 percentage points on Gallup’s optimism index matches 1998, the year of Russia’s financial crisis, RBC reported. The outlet said this year’s pessimism was two points short of 2013, when the economic optimism index reached minus 43 percentage points.

Russians’ pessimism toward 2021 compares to Gallup’s global average of 25% respondents who expect economic prosperity and 46% who expect difficulty this year.

Another 40% of Russian respondents said they expect no economic changes in 2021, compared with the global average of 24%, and 8% had no answer, compared with the global average of 6%.

Russians were among 38,709 respondents surveyed for the Hope, Economic Optimism and Happiness survey across 41 countries in November-December 2020.

This article first appeared in The Moscow Times and is republished in a sharing partnership with the Barents Observer.