In the article, it is mentioned that 12.5% of adults responded they did not have enough to eat in the past week alone. A few sentences later, 6.7% of household income is spent on groceries. I'm having trouble wrapping my head around these two percentages as they don't appear to be congruent.
Low income households may spend a higher percentage of their monthly income on rent, which leaves less money (in absolute terms) to spend on food even if the percentage spent is similar to other, high income households.
The concept of currency exchange rates has always mystified me a bit.
Maybe you explained it in here and I didn't comprehend. But why is there such a large disconnect between the exchange rate, and the purchasing power calculations?
Or to ask more specifically, why would anybody give 92 rubles for one dollar, if that dollar can only buy them about 25% as many groceries as the 92 rubles?
PPP rates are just hypothetical exchange rates and face a lot of limitations. It largely is under the assumption of "the law of one price" and that those products could be traded in the other country with no transaction costs or taxes. The market rate is also more susceptible to government intervention to inflate/deflate the rate. People also speculate on currencies, which messes with the market rate but not the PPR rate.
All that concerns average Americans is the price of groceries in America caused by inflation of the U.S. dollar by the political elite. An additional concern would be the widespread disinformation from the same people that the Russian economy is in shambles which is clearly false.
The article you posted is reporting a survey (not actual economic data) right in the middle of the pandemic inflationary cycle in 2021. This is misleading, the other bit that's misleading is not considering the noticeable lack of homeless people in the streets of Russia and that the majority of them don't spend nearly as much or anything on mortgage or rent with a large percentage going overseas to vacation every year.
In the article, it is mentioned that 12.5% of adults responded they did not have enough to eat in the past week alone. A few sentences later, 6.7% of household income is spent on groceries. I'm having trouble wrapping my head around these two percentages as they don't appear to be congruent.
Low income households may spend a higher percentage of their monthly income on rent, which leaves less money (in absolute terms) to spend on food even if the percentage spent is similar to other, high income households.
Interesting, I found this which I thought was eye-opening. Just a different persepctive. Living in Argentina, I can certainly relate to a lot that was discussed in this article. The pinch on the lower classes is real! "As their incomes rise, U.S. households spend more money on food but it represents a smaller share of their income. In 2022, households in the lowest income quintile spent an average of $5,090 on food (representing 31.2 percent of income), while households in the highest income quintile spent an average of $15,713 on food (representing 8.0 percent of income)." from https://www.ers.usda.gov/data-products/ag-and-food-statistics-charting-the-essentials/food-prices-and-spending/#:~:text=In%202022%2C%20households%20in%20the,representing%208.0%20percent%20of%20income).
A lot of the international data in the original article came from Our World in Data, which has a nice summary of this relationship: https://ourworldindata.org/engels-law-food-spending.
The concept of currency exchange rates has always mystified me a bit.
Maybe you explained it in here and I didn't comprehend. But why is there such a large disconnect between the exchange rate, and the purchasing power calculations?
Or to ask more specifically, why would anybody give 92 rubles for one dollar, if that dollar can only buy them about 25% as many groceries as the 92 rubles?
PPP rates are just hypothetical exchange rates and face a lot of limitations. It largely is under the assumption of "the law of one price" and that those products could be traded in the other country with no transaction costs or taxes. The market rate is also more susceptible to government intervention to inflate/deflate the rate. People also speculate on currencies, which messes with the market rate but not the PPR rate.
All that concerns average Americans is the price of groceries in America caused by inflation of the U.S. dollar by the political elite. An additional concern would be the widespread disinformation from the same people that the Russian economy is in shambles which is clearly false.
This article says over 60% of Russians spend half of their salary on food. (That sounds like a pretty bad economy to me.)
https://tass.com/society/1314425
What evidence is there that this would clearly be false?
The article you posted is reporting a survey (not actual economic data) right in the middle of the pandemic inflationary cycle in 2021. This is misleading, the other bit that's misleading is not considering the noticeable lack of homeless people in the streets of Russia and that the majority of them don't spend nearly as much or anything on mortgage or rent with a large percentage going overseas to vacation every year.