This is a series, I in the world, I'm John Bachelor. The Russian economy under severe sanctions,

an opinion piece in the Financial Times, Martin Sandu.

There are lessons from Russia's GDP growth, but not the one Putin thinks.

Moscow is that production of automobiles

has dropped by a third, and I testify from conversations

anecdotes with a colleague in Moscow you can't get parts not for a Western made

vehicle not for a German vehicle which is Premier in Russia now you can buy a Russian

made vehicle you can get parts but it's a tank.

It's not really a tank.

It drives like a tank.

Michael Berenstom, for the Hoover Institution, my guide on the Russian economy.

Michael, a very good evening to you. Martin Sandow says,

everything for defense, nothing for the consumer. And another wag has said,

they've recreated a Soviet economy. I was one time in Moscow in 1985, right as Gorbachev came in.

I noted in trying to shop that there was nothing I wanted to buy except maybe those fur hats and at the same time I noticed that the

military driving around were the only thing that looked well dressed and in a

vehicle that I feel safe in.

Everything else looked raggedy and overused and exhausted.

Is that where they're going, Michael?

Back to that 1985 moment when only the military got money.

Good evening to you.

Good evening to you and there is a moment in that direction, we're not there yet,

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