Earlier this week I had read a posting by Anders Åslund over on the Economists’ Forum blog at the FT which I had meant to get around to writing about.  In this interesting piece, Åslund puts forward the familiar argument that Russia is the odd one out in the BRIC group of economies – but not because of its crisis struggles or single commodity play, but rather because its market is so much more mature than those of Brazil, India, and China, featuring superior economic development. 

He points out some interesting facts:  Russia has the highest GDP per capita of the grouping at $12,000 – four times greater than China; two-thirds of Russians of university age are enrolled in university which matches Western levels; and Russia has 14 times more cars per capita than China and three times more computers per capita. 

These comparisons were particularly striking, as we had gotten used to hearing from analysts who believed that Russia should be dropped from the BRIC acronym for other reasons entirely.