Vladimir Putin drove a taxi after fall of the Soviet Union, says “not very pleasant to speak of”

Russian president Vladimir Putin admitted that he drove a taxi to make ends meet after the collapse of the Soviet Union.  

"Sometimes I had to earn extra money,” said Putin. "I mean, earn extra money by car, as a private driver. It's unpleasant to talk about, to be honest, but unfortunately that was the case."

The statements come from excerpts from an upcoming documentary produced by Russian state media. Titled Russia: Recent History, its release will coincide with the 30th anniversary of the fall of the Soviet Union.

The former KGB agent said he gave rides in his private car, a Volga he purchased back from his KGB post in Dresden, East Germany. He used the story to illustrate the hardships faced by the country’s people after the USSR’s demise, which he has once called “the greatest geopolitical disaster of the 20th century.”

This is at odds with statements he made in a 2018 documentary, where he said he feared he would have to drive a taxi after his mentor and first elected mayor of St. Petersburg, Anatoly Sobchak, lost re-election. Instead, Putin moved to Moscow and got a job with the government. 

Russia was the hub of the Soviet Union, which grew to include 15 republics across the Baltics and Central Asia. Its demise in the early 1990s brought with it a period of intense economic instability and widespread poverty for Russians as the country transitioned from communism to capitalism.

"After all, what is the collapse of the Soviet Union? This is the collapse of historical Russia under the name of the Soviet Union,” Putin said in the upcoming documentary. 

Putin’s past hardships are a stark contrast to his current estimated net worth of $70 billion.