The Russian government is sponsoring a “Day of Conception” today. Officials in the Volga River region (a demographically deficient zone about 550 miles east of Moscow) are giving couples a half day today to go home and make babies. Couples that give birth to a child nine months from
today, a Russian national holiday, are eligible to win cars, cash & even a shiny new refrigerator.

Since the Soviet collapse in 1991, population has been in steady decline thanks to lower birth rates, shorter life expectancies, emigration surges and a truly horrible health care system.

The world’s largest country by land mass is inhabited by only 141 million people. AP predicts that number could shrink to 100 million by 2050.

Putin has already installed cash subsidies for couples giving birth to more than one child. Last year, he went on record saying this demographic crisis is the country’s most severe predicament.