The second wave of the novel coronavirus pandemic may aggravate the problem of unemployment in Russia, head of the Russian Accounts Chamber Alexei Kudrin said at the All-Russian Civil Forum-2020 on Saturday, TASS reports.
"I expected unemployment to be about 8% on average, and 10% at worst. Now the unemployment is slightly below 7%, at about 6,8%-6,9%. It even declined slightly in the past two months. Regretfully, the second wave of the pandemic may aggravate this problem. So far, it still remains at a moderate level, [although] it is significantly higher than before," he said.
According to Kudrin, the government took unprecedented measures to preserve jobs, including by allocating loans and subsidies to small-and medium-sized businesses.
"Those measures produced the result, that’s why the unemployment still has not reached 8%," Kudrin said.
At the same time, the official added that the second wave of the pandemic was at its height, and peak figures were yet to be reached.
"We have not reached peak daily figures yet. I think this is going to happen a bit later," he said.
