I knew a girl from Salekhard. She said that during the commie days there were active coal mines up there, past the Arctic circle. Another girl I knew in Omsk grew up in a city in the Kolyma, also way up north. She said the only way in and out was by aircraft and in the wintertime the stores were often bare. Once the CCCP went belly up, everyone got the heck out.
Not a surprise, especially if the government never quite got round to handing out property to the residents. In China, the government has kept most of the rural population in place by granting the functional equivalent of ownership (70-year leaseholds*) to many tenant farmers. These leaseholds can be bought and sold, so many have been leaving the more remote areas after "selling" their plots of land, but the mere fact of property ownership (of a kind) has kept many farmers in place instead of surging towards the big cities.
* These leaseholds don't require any lease payments, but the land reverts to the government after 70 years dating from when they were granted, sometime after the Chinese regime began to allow private business activity starting in 1979.
>>>>>>>>>>>I knew a girl from Salekhard. She said that during the commie days there were active coal mines up there, past the Arctic circle. Another girl I knew in Omsk grew up in a city in the Kolyma, also way up north. She said the only way in and out was by aircraft and in the wintertime the stores were often bare. Once the CCCP went belly up, everyone got the heck out.>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
In fact Russian North is alive and well. Salekhard is a capital of Yanao federal district, one of the wealthiest in Russia in both average corporate and household income.