Ten Years a Prisoner

I have watched as my country has prospered from rising oil and gas prices. People’s incomes have increased significantly as well.

But the prices of goods and housing have also soared. Life in many Russian cities is now more expensive than in the United States or Europe.

The reasons are well known: state monopolism, corruption and inefficient administration, a consequence of the implacability of power and its excessive centralization in the hands of a single executive.