In this episode, Olya and Jeff sit down with Bill Courtney for a complete tour d’Eurasie. Bill is an adjunct senior fellow at the RAND Corporation and a former career foreign service officer. He served as ambassador to Georgia, Kazakhstan, and the U.S.-Soviet Bilateral Consultative Commission, and covered Russia and Eurasia on the NSC. We discuss the Russian economy, from taxi drivers and pension reform to sanctions and business conditions, and recent developments in Georgia, Ukraine, Kazakhstan, and Armenia.

At 3:34, Olya erroneously states that the minimum retirement age for women in Russia is being raised to 60. It is being raised to 63.

At 34:20 Jeff mentions the evolution of the term “Eastern Europe.” For context, we recommend you read Timothy Garten Ash’s article on the topic, here: https://www.nybooks.com/articles/1986/10/09/does-central-europe-exist/.

You can view Bill’s (illustrious) bio and read his recent publications, here: https://www.rand.org/about/people/c/courtney_william.html.

As always, keep sending us mailbag questions! If you would like to have your question answered on the podcast, send it to us! Email [email protected] and put “Russian Roulette” in the subject line. And, if you have one, include your Twitter handle, so we can notify you publicly when we answer your question (or, if you don’t want us to, tell us that). We look forward to hearing from you.