Soviet-style bureaucracy
The week's news at a glance.
Moscow
Moscow city officials decreed this week that employers must get special permits to hire non-Muscovites. Any Moscow-based company that wants to hire a person who is registered as a resident of a different city will have to submit 12 application forms and documents, and a special commission will take up to a month to study the application. Moscow firms said the new rule violated the post-Soviet constitution, which guarantees Russian citizens the freedom to work anywhere in the country. About 1 million Moscow workers—one-sixth of the city’s workforce—are registered as living outside the city limits, most of them in the suburbs.
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