Over the winter of 2014–2015 GDP was falling by more than 10 percent per annum. It would not stabilize until the second half of 2015. For ordinary Russians the crisis of 2014–2015 was considerably worse than that of 2008–2009. Real wages fell more sharply and rebounded less vigorously. The Russia that emerged from the Ukraine clash was above all a nationalist regime whose citizens were called upon to pay whatever price was necessary for their nation’s reemergence on the global stage.
