Still shocked by the unthinkable war between Russia and Ukraine, I wanted to write a personal account of how events of the last decade preceding the war appeared on the inside.
I'm a Russian immigrant. I left the country in 2020 for the reasons that appear economic. But I had little choice as the alternatives meant to lose a living or to forfeit my career, and work for the state supporting the regime.
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Estimates of state-controlled share of the Russian economy of 60-70% are well known. Less is known about life outside the state bubble. Even Russians who work for the state are oblivious to the life of ones employed in the private sector and entrepreneurs.
Since 2014, there was a consistent pressure on everyone who's livelihood doesn't depend on the state. It accelerated in 2016, once the Russian government realised that the new US administration is even less friendly to them than the previous one.
I've been self-employed and an entrepreneur in Russia between 2016 and 2020 and witnessed many of the restrictions even at a small scale.
Tax office suddenly introduces Kafkaesque redtape, requiring new complex paperwork for simple filings. I've received letters from the tax office threatening a criminal investigation for allegedly unpaid $0.80 worth of taxes. One may think it's a sign of a strict rule of law, but there isn't any. When I was defrauded by a property developer who ran away with a large prepayment, all confirmed by the paperwork, and asked police to investigate, the response was that I must be mistaken, and they will open a criminal investigation against me for libel if I contact the police again. Anyone can be declared a criminal at an official's will.
Taking payments from customers was made as hard as possible. After 2018, Russian businesses that accept online payments are required to email a tax receipt (has to be in Russian even for export sales). The receipt must be issued for each payment by a specially certified tax register machine continuously connected to the tax office. Services like Stripe aren't available or affected by the same regulations.
Larger payments were impacted too. Customers from many countries couldn't send wire payments to Russia since 2014, as it's easier for foreign banks to reject transactions than to check sanctions' list with hundreds of entities. No foreign investments. A constant threat of sanctions with talks of shutting down SWIFT and cross-border payments any day since the 2018 Skripal poisoning.
There's a theoretical option to do a business targeted to internal market if one can figure out how to grow in a market with real incomes decreasing for a decade. It's telling that the most successful entrepreneur who started businesses after 2015 that I know achieved success with payday loans innovations and a temp work marketplace.
As a result, the only way to survive for most people is to work for the state or a state-controlled corporation.
I chose to emigrate instead.
It's a one-way route. I had to forget a comfortable life in a beautiful flat I owned, a nice car, leave friends and relatives behind, move to a new country and start building my life again. Even in 2020 it didn't feel like a choice.
I didn't expect a war with Ukraine, but it was obvious that I'll somehow lose the ability to make a living if I stay.
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I didn't want to publish this initially because of the atrocities of the war that are happening right now. The struggles I describe are incomparable to the suffering of people affected by the unfair devastating war between Russia and Ukraine that was unimaginable just weeks ago.
A few days ago, I received an email from a domain registrar. The email informed that the registrar decided to no longer work with me because I'm Russian, and therefore I must be using their services to earn money that pay for Putin's aggression.
I decided to tell the reality of entrepreneurs who work in Russia, having to fight against the state to survive. They are heroes and painting them as war criminals is misguided.
(A tiny subset of oligarchs who made their money by monetizing their friendship with Putin via corrupt government contracts are another story.)
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Initially, I assumed that the policies against private businesses were implemented to concentrate all productive efforts in a few large corporations architected to mimic soviet-era industrial ministries. Recent events showed that making most Russians dependent on state was the ultimate goal.
The West expected Putin to be restrained with a threat of sanctions. Instead, he embraced them readily. As one ambassador put it, "don't give a shit about all their sanctions". Lack of foreign trade, lack of access to foreign financial markets and 20% central bank rate are likely to destroy remaining private businesses that aren't dependent on state contracts. In the short term, sanctions only benefit Putin.
More people are pushed into dependence on the state, making them less likely to question the politics of the giving hand. Most people can't compare their true standards of living either: travelling abroad to developed countries was complicated because of visa regimes and is impossible now.
Having most of the population on payroll helps, but still was not sufficient to make people of Russia to accept a war with their closest neighbour where many have relatives. The solution was simple: acts of calling it a war and claiming that Russia attacked first were made punishable offences.
Any media that refers to the conflict as a war with Ukraine, or refuses to insist that it started because Ukraine was conducting genocide against Donbass rebels and was going to acquire and use nuclear weapons against Russia is simply taken off air.
Remember that major international social networks like Facebook or Twitter are now banned or restricted. Public gatherings are banned and result in immediate arrest. Repeat participation in 'unauthorised' rallies is punishable by criminal convictions, fines worth 2-4 years of salary and up to 10 years of jail time for the less lucky. Consistent political opposition activity is punished by freezing bank accounts.
Russians don't want war. Never wanted.
People just don't see a way to stop it.