About three-quarters of Russians (77 percent) say they are being economical; 56 percent are constantly cutting their expenditures now and 21 percent started to do so a couple of months ago, the Russian Public Opinion Study Center (VTsIOM) said.
The indicator stood at 73 percent in the second quarter of this year and 76 percent in the third quarter.
This economical attitude is mostly exhibited by low-educated respondents (77 percent) and pensioners (73 percent). The center polled 1,600 respondents in 132 populated localities in 46 regions on Dec. 6-7.
Sixteen percent of respondents said they had never had to be thrifty (this number has remained unchanged throughout the year) and 5 percent admitted they were economical before but had stopped acting in that fashion now.
The number of respondents who think that the current period is unfavorable for large purchases has grown from 50 percenr in the third quarter to 61 percent in the final quarter. The number of those who think that large expenditures are quite acceptable now has decreased from 36 percent to 26 percent.
Seventy-four percent believe that it is bad time to borrow (vs. 63 percent in the third quarter). Sixteen percent have the opposite point of view (vs. 23 percent in the third quarter).
