A sizable portion of Russians questions whether the inflation rate reported by officials truly reflects what people feel in everyday life. The claim has been echoed by a financial market survey cited by TASS, which notes that many respondents doubt the official numbers.
In the survey, about two-thirds of participants said they suspect prices have risen faster than the published rate. Yet a roughly third, 34 percent, believe that price increases have been modest in recent months.
Another clear thread is how people judge their own expenses. Nearly half of those surveyed, 45 percent, try to track inflation on their own by comparing current prices to those from earlier months. In contrast, 55 percent say a larger share of their take-home pay goes toward food and essentials, shaping their sense of cost pressure even if official figures tell a different story.
Commenting on the results, Yaroslav Bajurak, head of Vyberu.ru, noted that official data routinely sparks public debate. He explained that Rosstat’s figures reflect an average across the economy, while an individual household’s experience depends on its own consumption basket, which can diverge significantly from the items used in mainstream statistics.
The survey drew on a sample of three thousand Russian adults under the age of sixty, offering a snapshot of attitudes across different income and regional groups.
Recent market observations in Russia show shifting prices across sectors, including the used‑car market, where higher costs have become more visible amid broader inflationary signals. This aligns with a broader narrative that consumer sentiment often diverges from official inflation metrics when people compare their daily purchases with previous periods.
On a separate note, Rosstat had previously reported a smaller weekly inflation reading, with the week’s inflation measured at 0.18 percent, illustrating how volatility can punctuate the inflation picture from week to week. These dynamics help explain why many households pay closer attention to price movements in groceries, utilities, and transport than to annual averages alone, and why public confidence in official statistics remains an ongoing topic of discussion in Russia and beyond.