Yet contrary to expectations this economic collapse has not been accompanied by mass unemployment. They conclude that reported unemployment is misleading, concealing the fact that a large proportion of Russia's workers are employed without pay or working for wages on which they cannot afford to live. Between 1990 and 1996, GDP in Russia halved, industrial production more than halved and investment fell by 80 percent. But registered unemployment in June 1998 still stands at only 2.5 percent, although actual unemployment is estimated at what is still a relatively modest 11 percent. This research, carried out in the Kemerovo and Samara regions, focused on large state and former state industrial enterprises that still employ 85 percent of the industrial labour force, and a small number of new private enterprises involved in industrial production.
Social networks are still very important.
They are the primary means by which people move jobs and also provide access to secondary and casual employment. Wage differentials have been the main incentive for workers to move jobs. However large differences in wages between enterprises persist because of the low level of unemployment benefit, the desire to remain registered in one enterprise in order to receive other benefits, and the Soviet work ethic which involves a commitment to one enterprise. The absence of mass unemployment conceals low pay, unpaid wages and compulsory leave. Enterprises have been polarised into successful and unsuccessful sectors.