Who Bears the Cost of Russia's Military Draft?

In this paper we use data from a large nationally representative survey in Russia to analyze the distributional and welfare implications of the military draft. We focus on draft avoidance as a common response to highly unpopular conscription system ridden by corruption. We develop a simple theoretical model that describes household compliance decisions with respect to enlistment. We employ several econometric techniques to estimate the effect of various household characteristics on the probability to serve in the army and the implications for household income. Our results indicate that the burden of conscription falls disproportionately on the poor. Poor, low-educated, rural households are much more likely to have their sons enlisted compared to urban, wealthy and better-educated families. The losses incurred by the poor are disproportionately large and exceed the statutory rates of personal income taxes