4 Things You Should Know About Russian Demography That Vanity Fair Won't Tell You - Forbes

4 Things You Should Know About Russian Demography That Vanity Fair Won't Tell You - Forbes: As is so frequently the case when mainstream magazines try to deal with demography, Vanity Fair presents figures selectively and without much context. We’re told that Russian life expectancy is currently 64 for men and 76 for women, and that this is quite poor by international standards, but we’re told very little about how this relates to Russia’s own recent history (hint: it’ a lot better!). I kept waiting for the article to tell its readers that Russia’s population has stopped shrinking, that the total fertility rate is at a more than two decade high, that alcohol poisonings have decreased sharply, and that Russia’s actual demographic performance over the past 10 years has consistently exceeded even the most optimistic official forecasts. It never did.