• @[email protected]
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    3510 months ago

    Alright salary, but you are working 24/7 and you’ll have to get back home alive to actually enjoy it.

    • @Axiochus
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      510 months ago

      Eh, your family will get compensated in the event of your death. It’s not really sustainable long term, but Russia has dedicated quite a bit of budget to this. There’s still fraud and whatnot, obviously.

      • @[email protected]
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        2110 months ago

        I find the idea that the idea that people from another country tricked into conscription would get this benefit. If they got to this point by trickery, what’s to stop more trickery?

        • @Axiochus
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          1010 months ago

          The tragic thing is that, for some, it might be. Especially if they’re promised that they will serve in a supportive capacity, far away from the frontline. Once you’re there, these agreements don’t really matter anyway.

          • @[email protected]
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            310 months ago

            The tragic thing is that, for some, it might be.

            To add a context here: since the start of the war, the poverty in Russia dropped from 22% to 9.6%. Of course there are both a factor of manipulation with statistics before the presidential elections and a lag between poverty metrics and inflation, but the number still blows my mind: more than 10 million people were elevated from the poverty.

            But don’t get tricked here: people were forced to poverty, and then the government gave away a few coins back.

            • @SkippingRelax
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              1010 months ago

              Interesting conclusion. When I was half way through reading your comment I had just assumed the drop was caused by the poor being the ones sent to the trenches, dying as cannon fodder, and as such reducing the % of poor people across the whole population of Russia

              • @[email protected]
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                810 months ago

                reducing the % of poor people across the whole population of Russia

                No, no, no. Even Ukraine estimates Russian casualties as 400k, and they include severely wounded, pov, and Ukrainians mobilized from occupied territories. Russia has 120-140m people (there’s a conspiracy about how many people live there, but sociologists give this range). In the first COVID year the excessive deaths were about 1m. Hence the casualties, cynically speaking, is not that significant.

            • @[email protected]
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              710 months ago

              To add a context here: since the start of the war, the poverty in Russia dropped from 22% to 9.6%. Of course there are both a factor of manipulation with statistics before the presidential elections and a lag between poverty metrics and inflation, but the number still blows my mind: more than 10 million people were elevated from the poverty.

              I have zero trust in that people were actually elevated from poverty

              • @[email protected]
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                -110 months ago

                Why? The Russian government spends enormous sum on soldiers salaries, paying unthinkable $2000/mo.

                What’s your point? They don’t really pay this much? Or maybe the war has elevated 1m families of soldiers, while it was compensated by other events?

                • @[email protected]
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                  610 months ago

                  Not only do I not believe that people actually get that sum, but that their material conditions have actually changed for the better. They’ve made things better for their people during a costly war? Sure they have.

                  • @[email protected]
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                    310 months ago

                    It’s less that they’ve actively made things better for anyone and more that some of their currency is actually circulating to these folks in the first place. Think about the most dirt poor shithole town you can imagine in Bumfuck Kentucky, where there’s no running water and barely electricity, and then make the place 30° and covered in ice for 8 months of the year. That’s real life for some Russians. There’s not any money to even make out there even if the effort was put into it. So being put in the army and paid a soldier’s salary, even if half of it is being skimmed, is probably more money than some of these guys have ever seen in one place before. Add to that the requirement ability to travel through civilization, and they’re suddenly living a whole new life they’ve never dreamed of before. I’d call that an increase in quality of life, even if you’re only upgrading from Russian Peasant into Russian Soldier that’s still a fairly significant boost in some cases. Right up until some Ukrainian high schooler drops a pipe bomb in your lap from a drone to complete his killstreak.

      • @Olhonestjim
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        610 months ago

        In Russia, your family will get a sack of potatoes in the event of your death, certainly not your unpaid salary.