Moderator says there were many questions about low incomes. They play a video from a firefighter in Kaliningrad Oblast who says he is getting 12,000 rubles a month, which he says is not a living wage. Many firefighters, he says, have to take second and third jobs. Says this is one of the reasons why there are so many fires in Russia.
Activists in Arkhangelsk region, who for months have protested construction of a huge landfill site in Shiyes to store Moscow's waste, have reportedly been banned from addressing Putin today. Just as they've been banned from any publicity in state media
Putin says he needs to check the figures that the firefighter provides because he has already ordered that they get more than 20,000. "We need to look into every specific case," he says. Adds that additional funds have already been allocated to raise salaries for firefighters to around 30,000.
Correction: They've been banned from recording a video address from outside the landfill site, where they've clashed for months with an army of security guards and riot police. Instead they were bused to an alternative location.
Moderator says that many people are writing that life has become more difficult and asks, "when will things get better?"
- By Carl Schreck
Quick work: Putin's spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, says some of the complaints citizens submitted for the call-in show have been resolved even before it started, RFE/RL's Russian Service reports. Still, we can probably expect some regional officials to get a public and stern talking-to from Putin. Peskov says he will most definitely speak with leaders in "specific regions" where citizens have flagged problems.
Putin mentions sanctions and low prices on energy exports. Admits that average incomes have fallen in recent years, but says they are now on the rise. Says that paying off commercial loans has also had a negative impact on incomes. Says it is hard to get a handle on wages because of large variations by economic sector and geographic region, but adds that average figures do show an upward tendency.
Putin says main issue is to improve worker productivity and on that basis lift the entire economy.
- By Carl Schreck
From the popular and bitingly critical social-media personality StalinGulag, who only recently revealed his real identity.
--"Vladimir Vladimirovich, our wages are falling, we are getting poorer."
--"In fact, wages are rising, but I want to tell people out there on the Internet: don't get mad. Wages really are rising, just not yours."