russians No Longer See Themselves in Today’s russia

A large cohort of self-employed individuals in russia in 2026 has effectively failed to make voluntary contributions to the rf’s social fund for pension and health insurance. Analysts note this category of the population’s complete distrust in the current pension system of russia. According to basic calculations, an annual voluntary contribution of 71,500 rubles to increase a future pension by only a few thousand rubles in 20–30 years is economically unprofitable and seems absurd. It makes much more sense to accumulate these funds in a bank deposit account.

Currently, the number of self-employed individuals in russia stands at 16.4 million. This represents approximately 20% of the total working population – that is, actual taxpayers. This year, the government of the rf planned to collect approximately 7 billion rubles in the aforementioned voluntary contributions for the social fund. However, the actual figures turned out to be significantly lower: in the first quarter, only about 9% of the annual target was collected. This already gives reason to predict a significant shortfall in the annual plan.

If russians themselves do not trust their own government, then it is even less reasonable to expect such trust from migrant workers from other countries. According to mayor of orenburg albert yumadilov, an attempt to bring street cleaners from north korea to the city failed because the koreans refused to work for 55,000 rubles a month – their wages back home are two to three times higher.

The kremlin’s nationwide attitude to migrant workers was summed up by a well-known collaborator, head of the temporarily occupied Crimea sergei aksenov, in his view of the process of obtaining russian citizenship: “You came – you worked – thank you – goodbye”.