Russia suffered the longest and deepest recession ever even prior to the economic crisis in August 1998: wages had halved, employment had dropped by a third, and inequality had doubled. Worse still, benefits remained unpaid. How do urban households survive such an erosion of traditional sources of subsistence? Collaborative research by the Institute for Comparative Labour Relations Research in Moscow and the University of Warwick found that the polarisation of income and employment opportunities has resulted in the formation of a stratum of chronically poor households. Furthermore, the plethora of new jobs created by liberalisation are only open to the privileged few and thus contribute minimally to the relief of poverty.