Birth weight and physical stature in St. Petersburg: Living standards of women in Russia, 1980-2005

We analyze data on the height and weight of mothers and newborn babies between 1980 and 2005 in St. Petersburg, Russia. We find that women's living standards, as measured by their height, improved steadily from the end of World War II through those born in 1972, hence reached adulthood in 1990. Thereafter, heights declined. Evidence on both the length and weight of babies corroborates this pattern. Their values trace a “U” shaped curve with troughs near the mid-1990s. Thus, the anthropometric results on newborn as well as for their mother point to the strains and challenges to living standards experienced during the restructuring of the post-Soviet economy. This is a general result that has become a recurring pattern: economic transitions are almost always accompanied by biological strains.