A contract service ad in St. Petersburg, November 2023. Photo: Dmitry Lovetsky / AP Photo / Scanpix / LETA
The Russian economy has to date lost between 1.5 million and 1.7 million people, or about 2.2% of its total workforce, due to the war in Ukraine, data analysis carried out by Novaya Gazeta Europe has revealed.
The vast majority of Russia’s workforce losses are conscripts and professional soldiers who have been sent to the front line, as well as Russians who have left the country due to the war, and combat losses.
The number of Russian military personnel sent to war in 2022 and 2023 is estimated to be between 860,000 and 1.08 million. That figure includes conscripts deployed to fight in Ukraine following Vladimir Putin’s announcement of “partial mobilisation” in September 2022 — official data put their number at 318,000 — and professional soldiers. It is harder to calculate a precise number for the latter, but it’s likely to be somewhere between 540,000 and 740,000 for the first two years of the war.
Russia’s huge combat losses have placed an additional strain on the labour market. The Economist estimated earlier this month that between 462,000 and 728,000 Russian soldiers had been seriously injured in the war, some 110,000–150,000 of whom had been killed.
Many of those who have returned home from the war are disabled, or otherwise unable to resume their previously held positions.
As the Kremlin is showing few signs that it wants to bring the war to an end, based on figures for the first half of 2024, the number of individuals being removed from the economy by conscription or voluntary enlistment in the military could rise by a further 50–60%, depending on whether or not a new wave of mobilisation is announced.
Even if the Russian military only recruits professional soldiers going forward, then the economy will still stand to have lost between 1.7 million–1.9 million people in total between the start of 2022 and the end of 2024, the figures varying due to differing estimates of the number of professional soldiers in the Russian military.
If there is a new wave of mobilisation, however, the number of individuals removed from Russia’s workforce could rise to anywhere between 1.9 million and 2.1 million, the equivalent to 2.8% of the labour force, according to the highest estimates — a figure fraught with macroeconomic risks.
