Piatrouski’s double inflation: How a pro-government expert downplayed European economies

Context: In 2025, the economies of Poland and Lithuania grew two and a half times faster than Belarus’s. Poland’s GDP grew by 3.6%, Lithuania’s by 2.9%, while Belarus’s increased by just 1.3%.

On March 3, 2026, political scientist Piotr Piatrouski said on Międzynarodowe Radio Białoruś (International Radio Belarus — a state-owned Belarusian international radio broadcasting and media platform owned by Belteleradiocompany) that official economic indicators of European countries cannot be trusted and that statistics camouflage serious problems.

“It means that it’s a technical increase in GDP, it’s inflationary. They printed and issued even more money, and that emission formally increased the economy. <...> For example, in Germany, there was a 0.1% decrease in GDP and 3-4% inflation. This means that the real decrease in GDP is 3-4%.”

In other words, the expert argued that the growth of European economies is solely the result of money emission. If you subtract inflation from the GDP figures, growth becomes negative.

This is far from reality. Both Eurostat and national agencies publish data that has already been adjusted for inflation. In 2025, Germany’s GDP grew by more than 3% at current prices. However, the Federal Statistical Office of Germany (Statistisches Bundesamt) reported a real, adjusted figure of 0.2%. This figure is used in official reports. In contrast, Piatrouski proposes subtracting inflation once again from data where it has already been removed.

European experts use the “chain volume” method. They calculate the total value of goods produced in a given year by multiplying the quantity produced by the previous year’s prices. The Belarusian Belstat does the same thing and calls it a calculation of comparable prices. The pro-government expert attempted to expose standard global practices as fraudulent, even though Minsk’s official approach remains the same.