Sanctions and counter-sanctions : what did they do?

Taking the multilateral sanctions program launched against Russia in 2014 as a case study, this paper investigates the economic effects of sanctions and counter-sanctions on a target economy. A synthetic control method for comparative case studies is employed to construct counterfactuals. The estimation results demonstrate that in Russia following sanctions and counter-sanctions real GDP per capita, FDI net inflows and income inequality fell, while the ban on agricultural and food imports introduced by Russia boosted the domestic agricultural sector, resulting in higher agricultural productivity and farm worker incomes. Various placebo studies confirm the significance of obtained estimates. Results are robust to random donor samples.